The Pride of a Prince the Resolve of a King
by Hypnomagica
Summary: Naruto made a decision at an early age, an amazing discovery leads him to make a different decision. "Resolve is only worth anything if it's worth your life" DISCONTINUED
1. Prologue

**A/N: Okm this is my first real story so feedback, both positive and negative is greatly apprciated. This is the follow up to a teaser I posted on here a little while ago entitled "Sakura in Trouble"**

**A few quick notes: There will no Janglish used in this story, I hate that. This story is written in English with the understanding that everyone is actually speaking Japanese.**

**The only time you will see Japanese is for ninja techniques, ranksand titles (ex: **_**kage bunshin no juistu, Jounin, Hokage, etc) **_**because it just isnt the same in English and suffixes such as "sama", "chan", etc because there really is no English equivalent. Also I will probably replace "yes" or "affirmative" at times with "**_**hai**_**" or "**_**osu" **_**because, like with the ninja techniques, saying it in English just isn't the same.**

**Authors Note**

**Ninja Techniques"**

_**"Kyuubi"**_

_"Character thoughts"_

_**Prologue:**_

It could have been a night just like any other in the suprisingly peaceful ninja village of Konohagakure, the wind was singing gracfully through the forest which surrounded it, causeing thousands of trees to play a symphony of rustling and weaving, millions of trees broke from their boughs to dance in delight along with the giant orchestra in which they lived. Babies inside the village slept peacefully, warm in their blankets as thier parents carried them as gently as they could, cooing to them softly and lovingly as they made their way to evacuate. Yes, it _could_ have been a night like any other in the VIllage Hidden in the Leaves were it not for the tiny matter of a very large and nine-tailed demon fox being only a few miles from the village. It might have been a perfectly ordinary evening for the residence of this village if the ground behind and at the feet of the Great Fox were not saturated with the blood of slain shinobi, those who had died in a seemingly vain attempt to halt the Fox' progress, if the landscape for miles around were not permanesntly altered with the signs of the "battle", if the tears and sweat of the fallen and the fighting was not mixing together on the blood drenched battle field and the mighty roar of the Kyuubi no Kitsune had not been peircing forever into the dreams of all who heard it....this night could have been just like any other.

Tragically though, it was not a night just like any other and the ninja who proudly wore the insignia of their village were, in fact, dying by the hundreds. Genin, Chounin, Jounin and even ANBU were all fighting and dying at the claws of this mighty creature and it seemd as if there was simply nothing which could be done to stop it, those who opposed the Fox were as fast to fall in defeat as they were to rise in challenge. Moral was slipping even more quickly than the number of shinobi, many on the feild were already feeling the absolute reality of the fact that they and everyone whom they loved were about to die and there was nothing that anyone could do in order to stop it. In some, a tiny inkling of hope remained, though all seemed lost and anyone with eyes would think that nothing could possibly stand before this creature which slaid hundreds of shinobi with almost no apparent effort, like a man casually swatting away whatever insects who approached with more annoyance and contempt than anger. Some of those ninja on the feild however, remembered that they too had a man capable of defeating over a hundred enemies in mere moments, that they too had someone so powerful as to seem almost god-like, these shinobi remembered that their Hokage was strong, more importantly, they beleived with absolute cetainty that the Fourth Hokage of Konohagakure would not allow his village to be destroyed, no matter what happened, they beleived that Minato Namikaze would save them in the end. They were correct.

As men, women and adolescents fought, died and despaired a sudden, golden ray of hope appeared atop the back of an unbeleivably gigantic toad. Even amongst the many shinobi who had given up all hope of victory, who had decided that even the Hokage could not defeat this beast, a feeling of joy, releif and jubilation could not be escaped. Faces covered in bitter tears, soot, blood and burns were washed by an open flowing of tears of joy, many dropped to their knees, some openly wept, all cheered.

"THE FOURTH HAS ARRIVED!!!!!"

Chants rang out from all with the energy to yell, attacks were launched with renewed vigor, even defeat was not so scary when your leader fought along side you. Fresh determination glowed in the eyes of every human present, and no ones eyes held more determination then the "golden ray of hope" atop the Toad's back.

Minato Namikaze gazed cooly at the incredible beast before him, far from him and the task at hand, his mind was on the infant boy he was about to bestow with this burden, the wife that had died in his arms, and the decision he and his wife had made. Questions like:

"_Did I do the right thing?"_

_"Will Naruto grow up happy?"_

_"Has Kushina already made it to the Afterlife?"_

_"Will I meet her there?"_

_"How much will dying hurt?_

Were spinning around his thought process even as his body prepared for the impending battle. He sighed with agitation and tried unsuccesfully to get his head in the game when a deep, rumbling voice rang out from beneath him.

"You did what you thought was best as you're doing now.

Probably not but life shouldn't be too bad for him, he's got Jiraiya afterall.

She is watching us even now.

You will meet if you are destined to do so.

Probably"

Minato's eyes widened in shock at Gamabunta bussiness like anwering of all the questions that still labored his mind with doubt and worry.

"G-Gamabun-" He started in suprise before being cut off by the ancient Toad.

"Just how long do you think I've been alive kid? And I've known you since you were a tadpole, you think I don't know how you think? Show some respect and get your head in the game!" The Great Summon's words were a tad harsh but that was exactly what The Fourth needed. Suddenly all of the doubt and worry dissapeared and his mind returned to his body and the situation at hand. With a wry smile, he lifted his gaze back toward the Fox, slapped his face simultaneously with both hands, and shook his head as if to dislodge water which had colected in his hair.

"My aplogies Gamabunta-sama." Minate emoted with the usual calm back in his voice. "it seems I still have much to learn from you."

"Heh," the Toad grunted with jocular rebuke "you could live to be one thousand and you'd still just be brat as far as I'm concerned"

The Fourth cheekily responded, "Well then, I suppose it's just as well that I won't living past tonight." with that, he returned his gaze to the creature in front of him, the determination in his eyes now shining in sync with the will of his heart. There was only one thing left to be said, Minato said it with no doubt wavering in any portion of his being.

"Let's go, Gamabunta-sama!"

"HAI!"

The Toad charged, the Fox atacked, the Fourth Hokage sealed, a legend was ended just as a new one was began.

As the smoke cleared, and the Kyuubi was sealed Minato Namikaze layed on the warty back of his life long friend, he thought of all those he was leaving behind, the things he had not acheived and the happy old age he would never reach. Quietly, as he lay dying he made peice with all of these things death was a simple fact of life, particularly if one happened to be a ninja, he had buried many just as he knew that he would be buried. The next generation would pick up the torch and life would go on. Just before consciousness left him for the last time, the blonde legend breathed six final words, words that would shape the fate of the entire world:

"Become a good king, Uzamaki Naruto!"

**So that concludes the prologue of what will be a rather long fic. Next installment I'll be explaining some things and we get into the REAL action. Till then, enjoy and review!!**


	2. Naruto's Bad Day

**Chap 1. Naruto's Bad Day**

**Five years after the night of the Kyuubi atack:**

Naruto walked home from yet another depressing day of school, as he lumbered along, taking the long route to the orphanage which a stranger might mistakenly have called his home, he began to lament all the unfairness of his life, with each one he counted, he began to feel the dark void of depression becoming a heavier and heavier load to carry. He thought about how his teacher always seemed to bully him, to pick him for the chores no one else wanted to do and calling on him when he clearly did not know the answer. He thought about how all of the kids warily ignored him after (according to one particularly out-spoken blond girl) all of their parents told them to avoid Naruto. The thought of parents brought along an entirely different bought of self pity. Why didn't he have any parents, he knew that he had no parents from the time he had mistakenly reffered to one of the keepers at the orphanage, a kindly, round woman who always seemed to be smiling and all the children adored, as "mother", all the other children did afterall. She didn't strike him, no one ever so much as laid a finger on him, however the repullsed, disgusted, insulted look the woman gave the young blond after being called "mother" did more damage than any blow could ever do. As he thought about this, the giant stone of cold weight only increased inside of his chest and he felt the familiar lump inside of his throat begin to form. The thought of the caretaker woman brought about a new unfairness the univers had seen fit to bestow upon him, the attitude every one adult he had eve met had towards him. They were not eyes of anger, per se, or even really those of hate, Naruto wished with all of his might that those eyes showed such hot, direct emotions. The look the villagers gave the boy was one which seemed to reject his right to exist, which would look everywhere but him unless given absolutely no choice and when they finally turned upon him he was regarded like a week old peice of dog-shit. A heavy dose of digust mixed with annoyance that it was even there, this was how all of the eyes which ever turned on him saw him, like some absolute waste of space whose very existance brought inconvenience, the world would be a better, cleaner place without him. At this point the pain became so palpable that the slightly dirty, extremely lonely, depressed, child gripped at his shirt as if to try and pull his heart out of his chest in order to stop the pain.

"Why?" He asked himself as he walked into a dreary alleyway and sat down, hugging his legs pulled to his chest with his head on resting on his knees. "Why does everyone hate me?" As he asked this the lump became so big Naruto was suprised he could breath, he felt he all too familiar pressure begin to build up behind his eye, finally he asked the question which broke him every single time and this time, out loud.

"Why..." he asked the empty semi-darkness which surrounded this alley way during sunset, his voice cracking almost beyond the point where his voice might have been recognised as human, "why doesn't anybody care about me? Why doesn't anyone love me!?" At this, he finally broke down, his tiny shoulders began to heave as he cried with pain and lonliness so profound that not a single sound was made. The cry came out in a silent wail that trascended all level of pain, a cry born from feeling with all of his heart that not a single person in the entire world had ever cared if he lived or died, that everyone would be much better off if one day he had simply ceased to exist. He had no friends, no family no one who would ever comfort him when, at times just like the one at hand his grief became so unbearable that angry red streaks had appeared over his chest where he had attempted to claw his own heart out. His pants were now completely soaked by the copious level of mucus and tears which had spilled onto them, being that his face was still resting on them as he hugged his knees to himself which, even though he could not be sure as he had no memory of ever actually receiving one, almost made it feel like someone else was hugging him. Finally the heaving in his shoulders began to lessen and his sobs went from the silent, soul raking variety to the more audible, suppressed gasps heard by most children his age. Throughout the entire time only one word circled throughout his brain, this word became his entire world, it encircled everything he was, his entire existance was preoccupied with this one, simple query. "Why"

Finally, the child stopped crying, not because the pain had lessoned at all but because he was simply too tired to continue and he didn't have any liquid left in his body for which to make tears of, Naruto figured the he must have cried the entire ocean in his lifetime. Looking around, he realized two things, the first realisation being that it was already dark out, except for th moon which shone with unusual clarity and the second realization being that he was in an extremely scary alleyway. The moon shone just over the side of the building in front of him so everything that was not two feet in front of him and bathed in sunlight, was competely black. The walls on the buildin he was resting in were splochy and damaged, paint was peeling and several wooden planks on it were either broken or badly patched up...or both. As he looked around, this allyway which had, during the day been as commonplace to him as another other spot which he has passed countess times from he long walks to and from school, transformed itself into an ominous and peculiar new world, where all the things that go "bump" in the night must live and where no stupid children who were foolheardy enough to stay past night fall could ever hope to leave. Panic began to set in. At this time Naruto could only think of one sensible reaction in response to thie predicament, he ran away.

The young blonde ran blindly, not paying much attention at all to where he was going, only trying to escape the pursuing feet which his imagination had managed to procure as a bit of completely unneccessary, added motivation. Seeing a fence which seemed low enough, the child decided it would be a good trick to jump behind and over it in order find a place to hide. It was a very low lying, chain mail fence, perhaps three feet high at a stretch, Naruto however, being a five year-old had quite a bit of trouble getting over it. His situation was not helped by the fact that the longer he took, the closer he imagined his monster were getting and the closer they got, the more panicked he became, in parallel, the more he panicked, the more slowly he got over the fence. By luck he managed to roll his was over the fence, he landed relatively softly on his side, the blond was not even down a moment before he was up and diving over a bush right in front of him. He waited and listened to see if he had been followed when he was startled nearly to death by a very low, extremely ominous growling coming from behind him, Naruto froze.

Closing his eyes, the boy wished with all his might that whatever was behind him might simply go away and that he was just imagining things, it did not and he was not. With a sigh of defeat, the blond truned slowly around to come face to face with a very large and very mean looking dog standing in a position which very much hinted at less-than-peacful intentions. This moment has a very special and uniqe significance in the young boys life. For the first time ever, Naruto truly beleived that he was going to die. This was also a momentous occasion because he learned something very important about his personality, Naruto was a survivor. Set with a moment of real, life threatening peril the blonds mind did not freeze up nor did it panic, contrarily, his mind became completely occupied with with finding a scenario which did not lead to his death. He began to weigh his options.

1. Fight- The boy placed himself at about 1/3 this dogs weight and perhpas half it's size. Even thinking, as all young boys do that he was able to kick significantly more ass than he was actually able to kick, Naruto saw the methematical flaw in this plan. Add a mouth full of very sharp, hungry looking teeth and the end result did not look good for our little blond hero.

2. Run away- Naruto was quite aware that even for a child of his age he was no speedster, he was also clumsy and would have had a very difficult time with climbing the fence which blocked his potential escape. There was also the manner of the dog having four legs and himself only having two.

3. Stare the dog down- He had learned from "over hearing" a few conversations which some of his fellow children at the orphanage were involved in that if one could stare a dog in the eyes with no fear what-so-ever, the dog would back down and possibly even do tricks for you! The single, tactical flaw the he saw in this would be his also heard that if you showed fear, the dog would atack and Naruto was much too afraid to bet his life on a staring contest.

4. Destract the beast for just long enough to ge to that tree and climb it- Not a bad idea, dogs couldn't climb trees (or so he had heard) and the tree was just close enough in proximity to where he stood for it to be a feasible plan. Of course, it had a rather large possibility of failure and if it failed Naruto was quite convinced that the dog would eat him.

Plan four it was! Carefully, the blond began to inact his amazingly genius idea by slowly picking up a small stick locted near his feet (there were actually many small sticks and twigs scattered throughout the yard but this was the largest one within reach...it was not very large.) Rising just as cautiously, Naruto began moving the stick around in what he hoped was a payful manner and making soft, high pitched kooing sounds. The canine, a great, long-haired, black creature with a head the size of the boy's entire torso and a thick, almost bullish body, did not seem impressed, despite himself though, his eyes began to track the stick.

"Gooood boy" Naruto cooed. "You want the stick? Yeah you want it don't ya?" As the dog began to pay more rapt attention to the the stick, the blonde's movements became more limber and daring, he began feinting and wagging the stick inches infront of the beasts muzzle. "Oh yeah you want it huh?" The boy taunted, getting into his role "Who wants the stick? You want it?" What Naruto failed to take into account was the rather testy animal's pateince not being the highest. "OOOhhhhh yeah you want it huh? Who's stick is it? Whose sti-"

Naruto's next words were interupted by a very resounding "ROOF!!!" from the very large dog in front of him. The next bit of action happened in extremely quick succession over the span of about five seconds:

Naruto threw the stick up and over the dog with a yelp before propelling full speed to the tree roughly five feet away as quickly as his feet could take him.

The dog jumped a few inches in the air, caught the stick and then proceeded to breack said stick into several peices using his rather unfortunately powerful jaws.

The boy's foot made contact with the tree branch.

The dog's attention changed from the stick to the blond.

Said blond jumped with all of his might from the tree trunk to the top branch and scrambled up and over it.

The Beast began pursuing him.

Naruto was almost at a safe height.

The dog jumped.

Naruto felt a very sharp pain on his back before being pulled down, the fact that his legs got stuck in between a few branches no doubt saved his life, a ripping sound was heard.

The canine jumped, jaws open, tageting a small patch of unruly, upside down blonde hair.

A boy saw his death.

The dog discovered that there were two very annoyingly placed branches which his jaw could not fit through.

Naruto suddenly discovered that he was able to fly up trees at amazing speeds when given the proper incentive.

The dog began to play with the child's shirt and promptly forgot all about the child himself, with the exception of an odd bark or two.

By the time he was once again fully conscious of his own actions Naruto began to fully appreciate the fact that he had almost had his head eaten by a giant dog. Up until now, his body had been acting essentially on it's own in order to survive. The blonde began to go through that moment in his head over and over again and realised that at the point when his death seemed imminent, he had invited it. He had decided that his life wasn't really worth living, a large part of him still thought so.

"_I should just go down there and let Fido eat me_." Voiced the mores emotional side of his personality. The argument had merit, life sucked, their really was no point in going on. Everyone wished him dead, why not do the world a favor?

"_Because gettin' ate by a dog would suck_" This argument made by Naruto's more pragmatic self. Another perfectly legitimate point however, judging from what the creature was doing to his shirt, Naruto could assume that his death would take quite some time and it would not be enjoyable.

"_Well, we're pretty high. Why not jump?" _Not a bad idea. The blonde stuck his head out from the tree trunk he was grasping for dear life and decided that if he jumped head first he would most likely die.

_"Yeah, why not? It'd be fast. Let's go for it, life sucks." _Well, it seemed that both sides of him were in unanimous agreement, guess it was the end. As Naruto prepared to jump, he began to wonder if perhaps anyone would regret treating him the way they did. As he descended the tree, branch by branch he decided, probably not. Life really was not worth living. He began shimmying along a rather low lying branch which actually ended outside of the fence. The blonde was glad that it was night time, he did not want to have a detailed view of the ground as he plummeted towards it. Infact, he decided that he would close his eyes as he jumped. Naruto let go of the branch and landed nimbly outside of the yard, ignoring the dog which had been begun barking madly the moment he had started descending. Well, no time like the present, the boy thought as he opened his eyes to begin the leap, imagine his suprise when he found himself walking purposefully in a direction that, even at this time of night, he could tell he had never been.

Strangely enough though, the young blonde was not afraid, not even nervous, in fact he was down right impatient to get...well, wherever it was that he was going. The child had no idea at the time but the deep and complete despair he had found himself in, accompanied by the feeling of certain death he had just experienced had triggered a fail-safe response, bestowed upon him by his father before Minato had left to fight the Kyuubi. Originally, the seal that had unlocked itself and was now glowing quite brightly over his heart in the dark night had not been supposed to go off until Naruto was 13. However a fail safe had been applied to it, one with a very specific imperative; Kushina had been of the opinion that if it so happened that Naruto was not treated as a hero and was instead treated with fear, anger and hatred, if he was isolated by the entire village from the time of his childhood he should be given the secret early. Minato relented only under the condition that said villagers put Naruto in a situation where he would become truly afraid for his life, seals however, are not people and can abide only to the standards to which they were set. It had lain dormant, directly under the child's skin for over five years and when the proper chakra spikes had ocurred which the seal read as "extreme depression" and "imminent death" the seal came off and the young blond was taken with the over-whelming compulsion to seek out a segment of Konoha that even the Third Hokage, with his crystal ball was entirely unaware of.

So, on Naruto walked, turning this way and that through different streets, until he reached the border of the vast forest which surrounded the Village Hidden in the Leaves, he then continued to walk without the slightest hesistation. Naruto felt so peculiar, he knew that he had no idea where his body was taking him, he also knew with just as much certainty that he wanted to get where he was going. Some part of him was absoultely sure of where he was going, more sure about that then he had been about anything before. On he trouped, through the dense forest and thick underbrush, taking turns at seemingly random moments, until the sun began to peek into the forest through the tree tops, still he walked. Naruto passed waterfalls, bears, creeks, ponds, hot springs, geysers and the boy kept walking, he walked up hills and underground he walked until it was dark again, never once getting tired. Finally he reached a tree that did not seem at all different from any other tree except perhaps that their was a slightly larger than average crow resting on one of it's branches.

"Squawk!" The bird screeched.

"Greetings," The child replied in a monotone voice, not his own. "I ask you fair brother, how many straws does it take to build a crabhouse?"

The black bird cocked her head at the boy a moment before responding, "Squawk! Nineteen plus twelve unless you've got some fare to share?"

"Then let it be," Naruto continued on monotonously, on some level he was still aware of the fact that he should not have any idea what was going on, despite the fact that he so clearly did. "I've got four berries for a bird who ferries the lost souls from this world to the next." The child produced three golden, trinangular berries, he was not outwardly aware of this at the time but these were amongst the most rare and delicious berries in the world. He had picked them up at one point when passing the only bush in the entire forest which grew them.

"Squawk! Then let it be!" At this, the bird descended from her pirch, plucked the berries from the boys hand and flew inside inside the roots of the tree. Naruto simply stood in waiting, as if what had just occured was an everyday happenstance. Hoewever, if the child should have been suprised at anything that happened during this excursion (and at some lever he was suprised at everything) it would the sudden opening of a door located inside the trunk of the tree. He showed no signs of surprise however, and simply strolled in as if it were the most natrual thing which could possibly happen. After stepping into the tree and having the door disapear as if it where never there, the floor under Naruto suddenly collapsed and he descended down a suprisingly smooth. dirt slide with the same confident, non-chalance he had kept throughout this entire trek.

Eventually, the ground evened out and the boy continued walking down an entirely black path with no possible way of knowing what was in front of him or where he was going...it probably goes without saying that he did. Walking down the hall, part of his mind was still in shock and horror at the fact that he had competely lost control over his body and most of his mind, he vaguley wondered if he was, parhaps possesed by some ghastly demon who was now bringing him into it's lair where said demon could consume to boy at leisure. Suddenly, Naruto turned off of the tunnel path he had previously been taking and crawled through a small hole in the wall that was covered by the moss growing all over the tunnel walls, his arms now on the cold, earthen floor, the blonde shuffled through the much smaller tunnel, earning several scrapes in the process until, finally he began to see a strange, blueish light. As he emegred from the tunnel his eyes widened in shock at the scene before him. Phospherant, blue moss seemed to grow on every inch of the walls, floor and ceiling, casting an almost etheral glow to everything in the cave. That was not the amazing part though, the cave was roughly the size of a medium sized house and was sculpted in way which made it seem man-made, though it was rather hard to tell with all of the moss. However, it was absolutely not the size of the tunnel which gave even this seal-controlled blonde breif pause, the eye truly eye-dropping facet of the room was an which alter stood on the far side of the cave. On the very top laid a gigantic scroll, resting peacefully in the jaws of a gigantic, moss covered dragon with eyes that might have been rubies if they were not so very large. The altar was in the shap of a very ornate flight of steps and on the next rung down laid several weapons that looked to be each worth several fortunes, somehow all that rested on the alter was completed untouched by the hands of time as well as the hands of the strange moss. On the rung down lay many, smaller scrolls in a very neat row which spread wider then two of Naruto's body lenghts, it was the bottom rung.

Acting with the same droll confidence that had landed the young boy in this predicament in the first place, Naruto approached the alter, kneeled down, grabbed the scroll which lay to the far left and, removing the seal which kept it from spilling out, ripped open the mysterious scroll. The moment he did this Naruto felt his mind return to normal, he was given just enough time to wonder what in the world was going on before the scroll exploded upwards with smoke and a loud "Puff!".

He instantly dropped the scroll and began to back away before he saw that a strange, dark figure had seemingly emerged from the scroll itself, the figure wasted no time in moving in for the kill. The blond tried to retreat however, a mix of being so thourghly confused and terrified on top of having not had any form of sleep or rest for over fourty-eight hours finally culminated in his legs simply giving out on him. Helplessly, the boy watched as the strange being fell upon him. Naruto's world went black.

**A/N: Zomg a cliff hanger! I wonder what happens next! Well you'll just have to find out won't you? Reading and reviewing makes me happy and motivates me to write more quickly. just sayin. ^_^**

**Next time we begin to get into the real thick of the plot, it should be fun. My apologies if this chapter seemed emo to you but I think it was justified and there wilol be plenty of action and bad-assery to be had in the later chapters.**

**Next chapter is going to be extra long so it may take me a few days. Til then everyone!**


	3. Family?

**So here is the new chapter, in by Friday just like I promised eh? Hope you enjoyed**

_He instantly dropped the scroll and began to back away before he saw that a strange, dark figure had seemingly emerged from the scroll itself, the figure wasted no time in moving in for the kill. The blond tried to retreat however, a mix of being so thoroughly confused and terrified on top of having not had any form of sleep or rest for over fourty-eight hours finally culminated in his legs simply giving out on him. Helplessly, the boy watched as the strange being fell upon him. Naruto's world went black._

The young boy felt strange, it was a warmth that had suddenly engulfed him, accompanied by a

strange sense of peace, suddenly he knew that as long as this warmth continued to engulf him,

nothing could ever harm him.

He felt a strange, softness pressed against his face and, suddenly realising that his eyes were closed, the boy cautiously opened them, as if afraid that doing so might ruin this strange feeling of peace which had overtaken him.

Naruto slowly allowed himself see what was actually pressed against him, what he saw made him blink rather rapidly in a state of supreme confusion before deciding that whatever had popped out of that scroll must have killed him because as he looked up, the blond was greeted by the site of a red-haired angel.

Even more baffling to the child was the absolutely impossible fact that this angel seemed to be, well, hugging him! While the idea was so blatantly impossible that the boy's first instinct was to dismiss it all together, Naruto simply could not find what else to call it.

His face was buried quite deeply inside of her rather ample bosom due to the fact that two surprisingly powerful arms were completely encircled around the child, pressing him quite completely into this amazing creatures body.

Naruto's failing attempt at trying to grasp even slight understanding of his situation was not at all helped by the un-ending storm of other thoughts which were also zooming through his mind with very little sign of slowing.

_'She smells good.'_

_'She's warm.'_

_'She's beautiful.'_

_'Her face looks sad.'_

_'She smells good.'_

_'Her hair's tickling my nose.'_

_'Why does she look sad?'_

_'I wanna know her name.'_

_'She smells good.'_

_'Let this last forever.'_

_'So this is a hug.'_

_'She smells good.'_

On and on, the thoughts kept spinning around the blonde's head, all of this thinking however was only done by a small portion of his brain. The vast majority of his intellectual ability was still in a state of shock and wander at the mere idea that a creature this amazing could even exist.

As if the situation could not get more ridiculous, the goddess whom Naruto had suddenly found himself wrapped in the embrace of, smiled with the most heart-wrenchingly beautiful and painful expression the boy had ever laid eyes on.

Her face shone with unspeakable joy whilst her eyes held unbearable sadness, as though.......well, there really was nothing which the young child could compare the scene to. Certainly, no one had ever looked at _him _that way before, no one ever really looked at him in anyway besides the way in which _everyone _looked at him!

Then, something else happened, something so extraordinary and unbelievable that any doubt Naruto might have had that he had died was completely eradicated. This angel, this goddess, this being of indescribably and all-encompassing beauty, spoke to him. However, despite this in and of itself being quite spectacular, the real wonder was in what she said.

With a sigh designed for the sole purpose of keeping the tears out of her words, Nauto's angel uttered the words which the boy had wanted to hear more than anything else in his entire life, most of all from someone like this.

"Oh Naruto," the woman began happily, "my son." Immediately after speaking such earth-shattering words, the woman with fire-red hair and the face of an angel, lovingly pushed a patch of unruly, blond hair away from the stricken child forehead and proceeded to press her lips loving against his tanned skin in what could only be called a kiss.

If the boy's head had been spinning before, it now exploded, his heart raced and something which he had never felt before in all of his five years began to well up inside of Naruto. Strangely however, there were no questions in his head, not a single nuance of doubt or skepticism existed inside of that blond head of his as to the accuracy of this woman, Naruto's mother's words.

Somehow, the boy had already known, in some deep and secret part of himself, the child had known from the moment he felt her arms around him that this was, without question, his mother.

And this is why, without having any worry or doubt in what his Mother Angel had said, Naruto asked the only question which it seemed reasonable to pose.

"Mother," the boy began in wonder, his voice holding a sense of hope and amazement that both joyed and depressed this woman, "am I dead?"

"No, my son, my dear, sweet, beautiful, son. You are very much alive." Came the red-head's loving response. This however only served in confusing the poor child even more. After all, wasn't he an orphan? That meant that this woman who was his mother could only be embracing him as she was if they were both in the land of the dead...didn't it?

The child decided he would need some amount of clarification, as if _he _was not dead than that would mean that _she _was alive! Naruto decided that living would be much more enjoyable if he had such a wonderful, pretty, loving mother to take care of him.

Despite this optimistic idea, the blond decided it would be best to proceed with caution.

"But, mother...aren't you...-"

"Dead?" She finished for him, a small smile gracing her lips. "Hmm, well that is a bit complicated, dear. Before we answer that, there is someone else that I want you to meet."

The red-head gently lifted Naruto's body a bit further away from her own, enough for the small child to peer over the shoulder of the woman.

Directly behind her, a tall, strong and very blond figure stood, smiling in a very similar way to the woman's down at the boy who seemed to be a much smaller version of himself, only with whiskers.

Naruto was once again left completely speechless as another reality-altering event took place right before his eyes. While young though he might have been, the child was not a fool, even he could figure out that if this beautiful woman currently holding him was his mother than the handsome man who was now approaching them must be his...

"Father."

Naruto could not comprehend why he was so certain that these two were his parents but seeing them together, feeling the large hand of the man being placed gently on his shoulder as the man fell to his knees along side the woman in order to wrap them both in a heartfelt embrace, Naruto was never more sure of anything in his life.

The the firs time in his memory, the boy was able to hear the voice of his father.

"Yes, Naruto. I am you father." Calm, soothing, strong, caring, loving, the man's voice was like nothing the smaller blond had ever heard. The mere sound of it made him feel strong, protected, important, as though the simple fact that his man was speaking to him made his life worth while.

In contrast, the woman's voice was like a sweet symphony, gently playing over all of the wound of the boy's heart, healing and building a new what he might have thought long broken. It made Naruto feel safe, special, and irreplaceable. It said to him that he was the single most important person in the world, tha no obstacle would ever get between them.

"Welcome home our son, we love you so much."

After a breif few seconds that Naruto would forever recall as the most perfect moment in his entire life, the child began to cry.

This cry however, was so different from any other time he could remember. Typically, his pain, loneliness, and depression would simply reach such a point that holding back the tears became impossible. Afterward there would be no relief, no improvement or better out look on life, just a deep, cold emptiness, a different kind of pain.

This tim was different, Naruto cired harder than he had ever cried before but this time doing so made him feel better!

Wrapped in the loving embrace of these two people who claimed to be his parents, every weep which escaped from him forced out the heart-wrenching pain that had been living inside of him and replaced it with something else. Something the boy had never felt before.

It was warm, light, happy, caring, a golden glow which seeped inside of ever corner of his heart, burning away the emptiness and filling it with all-new purpose. It was love.

Who knows how long those three remained in that position? The small, blond, child, telling the story of all the loneliness, pain, and emptiness he had felt through his life. The two figures, like guardians holding the child in a mutual embrace of protection, remaining on their knees, their eyes damp with barely suppressed tears as their hearts were battered with the knowledge of what the boy had suffered through.

Finally, Naruto cried himself out and then prompt fell asleep in their arms. Lifting the small body as if it were weightless, the red haired woman and blonde haired set the boy down on the soft, moss covered ground and lay on either side of him. This would be the first and last time the child known as Naruto Uzamaki would ever sleep so peacefully.

Naruto awoke to find himself curled into a ball and being snuggled by two, much larger figures. A brief moment of alarm and surprised came and passed before the boy was able to recall the events of the day before, he was ecstatic that it had not all been a wonderful dream.

Then he realised that the woman was very much awake and gazing with wide eyes at him, as if the child were the most precious treasure in the entire world. Naruto, having never experienced what it was like to be feel a mother's gaze, found himself tearing up a bit.

"I love you too..mommy."

It was not the only thing that the blond could think of to day but it seemed to him to be by far the most important.

"Kushina" laughed delightedly at this before returning the sentiment with a kiss and a bid, good morning.

Running her fingers tenderly though Naruto's hair, she decided that it would be best to get down to business, time was limited after all and there were certain things which she wanted to tell him herself.

Getting up, Kushina carried the boy to a compartment of the cave that Naruto had not noticed, a small sub-section with came away from the main cave like a separate room. It was about as un cave-like as any cave that the blond could have imagined.

The walls and floor were still covered with he same bio-luminescent moss, however inside of the area was a rather large, purple recliner as well as a desk, an open box of scrolls and a chest, both of which rested to the left side of the well sized, wooden desk. A strange, glowing crystal hung from a chandelier in the middle of the room, casting a clear, yellowish light which completely over powered the moss.

Taking a moment to allow Naruto to look around the room, the woman sat down on the recliner and plopped the blond on her lap. Both of them seemed equally determined to remain in constant physical contact with the other.

"Now," the angel-woman began "let us start with story?"

Having never had such an offer made to him before, Naruto was rather taken aback, yet delighted at the prospect of a story told just for him. His blond head bobbed eagerly, cerulean eyes widened in anticipation.

The red haired, angel woman gave a moment of dramatic pause before starting on the story of their shared blood line.

"This is a story that my mother used to tell me when I was your age and her mother did the same and her mother before that and her mother before that, all the way down the generations for thousands of years.

A very. very, long time ago, when civilization was only newly begining there was war and death everywhere, armies warred with armies over land, resources and blood disputes. The world was a terrible, dark place. Most people did not live past twenty years old and the Great Spirits ran rampant on the face if the Earth. To them humans were just like any other creature, short lived and foolish, desperately trying to carve out our existence for as long as they could.

Just like the humans, the Great Spirits were constantly at war with one another, they often used the humans. who worshipped the Spirits as gods, to serve as foot soldiers for their armies. The world was endlessly torn by battle, until one day a great Evil rose up and began destroying everything in it's path. As the great army conquered, it simply demolished everything, tens of thousand died at this hands of this Evil. It had no face, nor shape, nor reason, it existed only to destroy. Even the power of the Great Spirits was cowed by the Evil, as more and the Evil spread throughout the land, spreading destruction and chaos within it's wake, the last of those who resisted were pushed back to the islands of the West.

Among them were nine human men and nine Great Spirits, each one of the Great Spirits had been known as the mightiest of all of their kind. They had all once held the largest of all the Great Spirit territories, each with tens of Great Spirits serving under them with thousands of humans serving as their foot soldiers.

Of the humans were those who had once been powerful kings, generals and warriors. Each one of the eight had held territories completely free of Great Spirits. Though the territories were not large ine Great Spirit terms, the very fact that they were each able to fend off all attempts at being taken over over a Great Spirit as well as their ability to survive without a Great Spirit protector was a clear sign of their abilities.

They had all agreed to meet in order to organize some form of resistance against the Evil but could not come to an agreement on who would be the leader. Of course, all the Great Spirits thought that the humans should simply have agreed to submit to whatever they decided, the men, in contrast would never allow themselves or those who followed them to be led be taken over by a Great Spirit. In the end, it was decided that Jargi, the nine-tailed vixen who was the oldest, wisest and possessed the most powerful magic of all the others, would be the leader of the Great Spirits. The men chose amongst themselves a King named Tersla, a good ruler known for his level head in ruling and unmatchable talent for military strategy. With both of their leaders chosen, the men and and Spirits determined that they should simply run a jointly-led army, each side adhering to their own leader.

As the small resistance force leaders attempted to find a way in which to defend against the Evil, their foe continured to move until evey peace of land on the continent had been completely consumed, everyone knew that it was only a matter of time before the Evil moved on to the Islands. Time was, indeed running out. Finally the answer came.

It was Benji, the four-tailed monkey with a sharp, cunning mind who was thought of it. You see, the reason why the Great Spirits could not stand against the Evil was not because they lacked the power but oppose rather, due to the fact that they were spirits, the erosive power of the Evil turned them evil the moment a Spirit came into contact with it. Thus far, any Spirit who had risen against it in the past was simply consumed by the Evil and ended up increasing it's power.

Humans however, were not altered in anywasy by coming into contact the the the Great Evil except that once consdumed by it they were killed by the residing Evil Spirits rather quickly.

Benji proposed that if a Great Spirit could inhabit the body of a human their forces might actually stand a chance, this idea was not taken very well. The idea of joining a Sprit with human was seen as a travesty against the very laws of nature, on top of that, it was impossible. Though there were stories of long ago alliances between flesh creatures and Spirits, Gorg the Bear of Infinity, Kaeleminum the Eternity Shark, those were however, just stories.

There was much bickering and yelling amongst the group, Benji continued to insist that it was possible, Hael the five-tailed dolphin horse vehemently protested even the very idea of a spirit and a mud creature becoming one and Kilik, a human king that was well famed for his killing a Great Spirit in one-on-one combat, simply dimissed the idea as impossible. In the group there were many arguments, insults and threats made, this one disagreement seemed to allow a tirade of hitherto restrained resentment amongst them.

Mortal combat seemed immenent before Jargi silenced the whole ensemble with a single word, once all was quiet, she procceeded to shock everyone present with the claim that there was, in fact a way to join Spirit to Flesh and that she was aware of exactly how to accomplish the feat.

After the initial outburst brought about by this revelation, despite much dissent from certain members of the alliance everyone generally agrees with the idea that this was their only real chance at achieving victory, it was agreed that they would test procedure in order to see how well it worked. No one doubted Jargi's word, it was well known that a fox spirit never lied, only twisted the truth to fit it's purposes. Which suited them all fine since their purpose, for the moment, was shared.

Jargi explained to all present the circumstances and incantation which was required to make a fusion between the two beings successful. She also explained that the more powerful the Spirit, the stronger the humans will needed to be in order to withstand the fusion. It was the human Kilik who was the first to volunteer, along side him, Buri the eight-tailed giant ox volunteered to be contained inside of him. After the first two all others assembled milled about, discussed and cajoled in order to decide who their partner would be, it seemed like only the expected turn of events when Jargi agreed to allow Tersla to become her vessel.

On the full moon, three nights later, every member of the resistance from the most powerful generals to the meanest of foot soldiers were gathered around to see the spectacle. According to Jargi, the last human-spirit conjoining had not taken place was several thousand years ago, this was quite literally the event of the millennium."

"Mommy, what does mullinelm mean?" Naruto suddenly asked the read haired woman, interupting the story.

She smiled indulgently at the child as she answered, "One millennium is equal to one thousand years."

"Oh...how many years are in a thousand?"

"On hundred, hundred."

This seemed to satisfy the blond, as he again settled into the woman who claimed to be his mother's lap.

"Ok" he announced.

However. just as the woman was preparing to restart her story, the tall, blond man suddenly appeared, smiling happily at them both he announced that breakfast was prepared and waiting for consumption.

"Morning...dad." Piped the boy, bashfully.

With a warm smile, the taller blond walked towards the duo before picking up his miniature, "Good morning, Naruto"

The red-head rose with a sigh, picking up Naruto she made her way towards the man fixing him with a look that sent warning shivers up his spine she walked past him and into the main chamber.

"We'll have to finish our story later, dear."

**Well, that's it for this chapter! I actually originally intended it to be much longer but well I promised an update by Friday and I do have school to worry about. **

**New chapter every other day is still the goal though and I might be able to put in two longer installments over the weekend.**

**Also, I have gotten loads of notifications on people putting my fic on their story notification list and Favorit Stories which makes me really happy.**

**However I don't think a review is too much to ask for do you? I mean, if you find the story intersting enough put subscribe to it taking a few second out to review shouldn't be all that hard.**

**Big thanks to all of you who have reviewd my story and I do reply to all of my reviews so if you havent received my reply yet, I'm getting to it.**


	4. Secrets Revealed

**Well, here is Chapter 3: The Secret to Naruto's Past Uncovered! ****Hope you all enjoy and please make sure to review!**

_** Secrets Revealed**_

Naruto sat on the floor, listening the the sizzle created by the pork chunks currently cooking on the grill his father had set up, as he waited, enjoying the smell of barbecue pork, the young boy leaned back on his hands and began to seriously observe the two adults sitting with him.

The man was tall, with blond hair and blue eyes the same color as his own. The angles of his face were were rather sharp, bearing the same look of inherent strength which one might expect to see in a rock. The man had broad shoulders with the toned, well defined arms of a ninja. He held a quiet confidence about himself, like a tiger who had never lost a fight, though he seemed easy going and relaxed there was little question that he was capable of killing without much effort.

His eyes held compassion in them, the sort of compassion which only comes about with someone who has seen the very worst of suffering and pain and wants to prevent anyone from ever suffering the way he has seen others suffer. The taller blond also had a way of holding holding himself that spoke of strength, the man knew that he was strong, he accepted this as he accepted everything else in life, however being around his strength was not the kind which made one feel fear.

He seemed to have the sort of inner strength which would lift everyone else up with him, as if the strength he possessed would be given freely to anyone who did not have enough of their own.

The more Naruto looked at the man's face, the more familiar he felt that face looked as if he had seen that face his entire life but had never really noticed before. The young child simply decided this was due to some kind of forgotten memory he retained as an infant and dismissed the thought.

The woman was on the shorter side, with striking red hair and piercing green eyes, her face had a soft, quiet strength about it, her eyes also held that "I have seen it all" look of compassion about them. She had rather broad shoulders for a woman, with toned arms, and a large bust.

The red-head held herself in a way which spoke of barely repressed energy, her emotions came right up to the surface as if not even God could shame her out of laughing. The laugh was a rich, bubbly one, like a cheerful river which had just finished it's Spring thaw and was bursting with new life and energy.

Despite her straight-forward demeanor, it seemed like she was holding back a deep sadness and the laugh and smile was only a way for her to cover up the inner pain.

The more that Naruto thought about it, the more convinced he became that these people were his parents, they did not seem very dead either.

The trio ate in comfortable silence, occasionally exchanging small glances and smiles, the small, blond child, eating the grilled pork and fish breakfast could not remember ever being so happy.

As the group finished their meal, the man and woman exchanged meaningful glances clearly having one of those silent arguments only ever made by a married couple or close siblings, Naruto however, having had very little experience with either, did not even notice.

It appeared that the man had lost because after a few moments he resignedly cleared his throat in preparation for delivering the news which he was positive that his alleged son would not be particularly thrilled to hear.

Clearing his throat, the larger blond decided to just dive straight in. Figuring the more quickly it was said the more quickly the boy might get over it...it was worth a shot at least.

"Naruto, there is something we need to discuss, about your mother and I, you see strictly speaking we are, in fact, dead. Actually it would be more proper to say that out real bodies are dead these are what you would call "clones" creations of chakra formed into a physical body.

This cave and the majority of what is inside of it has been here since your mother first agreed to move into Konoha, it's the inheritance of your mother's family but we'll talk about that later. You see, we had not planned for you to find out in this manner, had it been up to us, your mother and I wanted to be able to take you here ourselves when you were old enough.

Unfortunately, things didn't turn out that way, you see, as you probably already know the day that you were born is the same day the the Nine Tailed Demon Fox attacked Konohagakure. It very nearly destroyed our village and I only had one way to stop it and that was to seal it away, a technique which required my life.

Your mother and I were in the delivery room when it happened, an old student of mine suddenly rushed through the doors and reported that the Fox had been spotted approaching the village, right away I gave the order to hold it off at all costs.

After some discussion, your mother and I agreed that my only solution was "that" technique however a creature of pure evil chakra such as the Nine-Tail could not simply be killed because it would only absorb all of the hatred and fear that would be found in Hell until it was strong enough to break free.

We had to seal it away into the only creature with the ability to contain such a beast, a new born human. Your mother convinced me that it had to be you, not just because asking another parent to offer up their child as the container would be something which I could never do, but because you are the only one who we could trust with such a responsibility, especially with your blood-line.

There was one other complication however, you see, a creature like that, of such pure evil and immeasurable age, if sealed inside of a child without a day of living experience, would definitely corrupt and take over the body of it's container.

We could not allow that.

Again, it was your mother who suggested the solution, I fought her on it, with everything that I had, you could not grow up an orphan, especially given who you are. In the end though, there only was one solution and we both knew that, we would have to split up the Demon Fox.

I had to seal the demon's chakra inside of you, while sealing it's will into another, the problem is, the two people who the two pieces of the Fox were sealed in had to have a direct chakra link. In all the world, there is only one situation which allows a charka link strong enough to sustain something like that.

The link between a mother and her new born child.

So, because we had no choice, inside of you I sealed the Nine-Tails and inside of your mother, I sealed the will of the Demon Fox.

Like I said, anyone who had that portion of the Fox contained within themselves would surely be corrupted and that is why whoever that portion of the was Fox trapped in, would have to sealed away. The official story is that your mother died during child birth, in reality I sealed her inside of a scroll which is currently resting safely inside of a locked trunk in the study.

She must not be let out with things the way they are, to do so would be to set free the Fox itself and then your mother would effectively die, instantly.

Just before we enacted our plan, your mother and I created these clones and we sealed them inside the scroll which you opened, as well as enough chakra to last them, or ratherm us, for 24 hours, after that, well I assume it all went according to plan, more or less, because you're here."

The man finished recreating Naruto's entire universe for the third time with an awkward sigh before adding in one last bit of universe shattering knowledge as an after thought.

"Oh and, if you haven't guessed already, my name is Namikaze Minato, other wise known as the Fourth Hokage. Your Mother's name is Uzamaki Kushina and well, if you think my story was crazy just wait until you hear hers!"

The aforementioned red-head was still glaring at Minato in a way that said quite clearly, "Way to throw me under the bus!"

Naruto however, only sat where he was, his head resting on his mother's arm, a blank expression on his face. The Fourth Hokage clone had been anticipating several reactions from the boy, screaming, crying. denial, and out right rage all being on that list.

But this state of unresponsive shock was the most worrisome, the Kushina clone seemed to concur as she gently took Naruto into her arms and began stroking his hair.

This seemed to break whatever spell that had taken the boy as he finally spoke up, his voice a tiny whisper that broke both of his parent's clone's hearts.

"So" he began, his voice trembling "you mean you're leaving after only a day? You're gonna leave me?"

Shocked at what seemed to be Naruto not quite comprehending the enormity of everything else he had just been told (he was only a child after all) Kushina-the-clone gently tried to make sure that the boy realised that he was the container of the Nine Tail and that it was entirely their fault his life had been so horrible.

"Naruto....we only made these clones so that you could find out who you are, but do you understand what else your father said, you do realise that the Nine Tailed Fox is-"

She was interupted by the boy tearing himself from her grasp, standing to his full height, he began to yell, tears beginning to form at his eyes.

"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THAT!!! What difference is it to me the whole village hates me!??? I don't care that everybody hates me 'caus you put a Fox inside me!!! I.....I don't care about none of that!! Just as long as I've got you!!! You cant leave me!!!!"

Finally Naruto stopped, unable to go on because the rock in his throat had become too large for even a little sound to escape, he silently struggled to hold back the tears before continuing.

"Mom and Dad...you guys are heroes! You saved the world from the Nine-Tails, Mom and Dad are strong!" The small boy fiercely struggled to keep the tears from falling out of his eyes, his fists clinched tightly at his side as he blinked them away. "Whatever Mom and Dad did....it was because you didn't have a choice! But please.....don't leave me alone. If you leave.....if you leave me all alone again....I won't have any reason to live. I would rather die than be alone again!!

If you two leave me then I'll kill myself!!! I SWEAR I WILL!!! YOU"RE MY REASON TO LIVE!!! WITHOUT YOU IT'S BETTER TO BE DE-"

"NARUTO!!"

The boys rant was interrupted by his father's stern reprimand, the boys shoulders heaved, he stared at the ground, fighting with all of his power not to cry, blood leaked from his palms where his nails had begun to dig in.

"Look at me." Came the order from the Fourth Hokage, the boy however stared obstinately at the floor. "Naruto! Look at me right now!"

The smaller blond finally raised his head to find that his father was now standing up, he also realised for the first time, just how large the man was. He was easily the most giant man that the boy had ever seen.

Minato seemed to be larger than life as if God himself would barely reach this man's navel. It was terrifying and impressive, Naruto could not look away.

Once his son had finally initiated eye contact Minato proceeded to fulfill his role as a father. The mother provided ineffable comfort to the wounded soul, gave love and forgiveness freely, the father was the unshakable pillar, the pool of infinite strength that the child could draw upon when he found his own lacking.

With this in mind, the Minato clone put on his Hokage face, the same face used when giving out orders or rallying his troops, as his eyes looked directly into those of his son, Naruto, for the first time, learned what it felt like to have someone look at him like a man.

Suddenly the boy no longer felt like a boy, he felt larger, stronger, as though no task would be too great if it was this man who asked it of him.

"Naruto, you are my son, the son of the Fourth Hokage, you are the container of Jargi the Nine Tailed Demon Fox of Eternity, you are the hero of Konoha and you are an Uzamaki! You do not yet realise what this means but trust me when I tell you that your mother and I did not bestow upon you any burden which we thought you couldn't handle.

From me you have inherited the Will of Fire, the spirit which burns inside of every Konoha nin, the spirit to protect all to pave the way for a better future. From your mother you have inherited so much more, you are a prince my son, you are the prince of princes! Most importantly though, you are strong.

I can see that as plain as day when I look into your eyes, within you resides the strength to accomplish any goal, overcome any obstacle and carry any burden. The loneliness which you feel from the villagers scorn, you can bare it because you are a hero. Because you are the the son of your father and mother you can accept the scorn of those you protect because they do not realise how great you are."

Finally, Minato crossed the small distance between himself and the boy to place his hand on the child's head.

"Even the most powerful of monster can forget for a moment his own strength, even the most strong-hearted of heroes might forget for a moment that he is brave, when you reach such a moment, remember this moment, remember the feeling of my hand on your head and my eyes looking into your own, remember that I am lending you my strength so that if you forget your own, you can borrow mine whenever you want."

Suddenly Naruto _did _feel strong, stronger in fact, than he had ever felt in his entire life, like a sapling which suddenly became a 10000 foot-tall redwood, all the the fear and sadness that came with the idea of being alone again was still there, suddenly though, it felt trivial. He was the son of the Fourth Hokage after all, he was the hero of the village and he was....a prince?

Shocking blue eyes turned their way questioningly towards his mother, "I'm a prince?"

Mianto's laugh at this abrupt question was cut short by a sharp blow to the head courtesy of Kushina. "Thanks for spoiling the story, idiot." The woman said, irritation evident in her voice. With a sigh she sat down next to Naruto and invited him to sit on her lap with a beckon. The boy curiously complied.

"As you remember from the story I was telling you earlier, the world was in big trouble and the Great Spirit Jargi had just told everyone that she knew of a spell which would allow a human and a Spirit to synchronise with each other. Magic was what we know now as ninjuistu and there were many, powerful sorcerers in the land, none more powerful than Jargi, however.

It was the first full moon since that time and the powerful warrior, Kilik was just about to fuse with the eight tailed Giant Ox, Buri as the entire resistance force watched. Well I can tell you that the spell succeeded and so did everyone after that. All of them, except for the attempted synchronization of Tersla and Jargi, everything seemed to have worked out well until, a little after the process seemed complete, suddenly the man became over-whelmed and the Sprit Fox had only just enough time to undue the spell and free herself from him before Tersla died.

It was assumed that the man's death was brought about because he didn't have the necessary strength of will and magic to sustain the synchronization and died because of it. Jargi was well known as the most powerful of the Great Spirit's so while this news was upsetting, many were willing to accept that she was simply too powerful and old to become one with a human.

After that, all of the other Great and Lesser Spirits who were part of the resistance joined with a human and soon the resistance army was at nearly maximum power, with Jargi staying behind because it was assumed that there was no human capable of containing her.

When the battle finally began it looked great for the resistance but the longer they fought the more they found out that even fusing with a human did not completely protect the Great Spirits from corruption. Jargi watched helplessly from a nearby island, her sorceress skills allowing her to view the battle even from the distance she was at. It was when Hoji the two-tailed demon Cat and her partner, a powerful human sorcerer became the first of the leading eight to fall to corruption, that she could no longer bare to watch with a sinking feeling of disappointment, the Great Fox turned away to wander around in depression.

She traveled to the farthest section of the island chain when the Eternal Fox spotted a run-down old wooden shrine to a long forgotten deity."

"What's a "deedy?"" asked Naruto

"A deity is a god, dear. Now hush, the story is just getting to the good part.

The most surprising discovery however, was that there was a little sitting within the shrine. She was completely covered in the cobwebs of spider's and many other bugs and smallish animals seemed to be using her as a from of residence.

A mother owl was even tending to her young on top of the young maiden's head, what might have been even more amazing about the girl, aside from the fact that she still seemed to somehow be very much alive was the vividly red color of her hair.

Jargi had never seen such hair and upon entering the shrine, found that here eyes, though covered by spider-webs were very much open and a startling shade of green.

With a single, mighty puff, blew off all of the wildlife that had been living on her, causing them all to land, safely in the woods outside of the shrine. The Great Spirit Fox looked curiously at the child for quite sometime. Paying attention to her pristine, sky blue, silk kimono which somehow was not even slightly damaged, the soft, pink tan of her skin despite having clearly inside fore quite sometime.

This was apparent because, when Jargi moved the girl from her position, the wood that had been underneath her looked fresh as new while the floor all around was old, warped and termite ridden. Most interesting of all was the fact that the moment the Spirit Fox came near the girl, she felt all of the impurity that had managed to gather inside of herself, disappear.

Jargi felt as pure and uncorrupted as the day she was born! Every spirit builds up a certain amount of corruption as they live, the negative energy of the world cant help but seep into them. Usually it takes ages for any significant build-up to take place and it tends to be mostly negated by the flow of positive energy also apparent in this world.

The strange maiden was even more strange because she seemed to emit pure Positive energy, the same way that the evil seemed to emit pure Negative energy. Jargi was so very busy trying to figure out her strange discovery that she almost didn't notice when the girl began to stir.

As soon she the maiden awoke she greeted the Fox as if completely unsurprised to see her, then confiding in the creature that she had been brought to this place, during a time which Jargi was able to place as having been cenuries ago, and sealed away because she had Seen that one day the world would need her. When that time came a Nine Tailed Fox would enter the shrine and take her out of it, which Jargi had done when she moved the girl.

The Spirit Fox suddenly knew why the girl had foreseen her need, Jargi knew without question that this girl was meant to become her partner, they would perform a synchronization and become one then the two of them together would purify the Evil.

And that is just what they did, it took several years of battle but eventually all of the Evil was eradicated and all of the Spirits and Great Spirits had returned to their normal states of being and the girl became Queen of the entire land. The Eight generals of the army became her most trusted advisers and allies and together, they used the collective power of the Spirits to build a great kingdom. When old age finally began to overcome her and her time to pace came about, she ordered her heart to be taken from her body, because it was her heart which allowed her to purify and Spirit or Great Spirit, to be passed on to all of her heirs.

She also released the Great Fox from their fusion, for as long as they were one she could not die and age had only come because she had asked the Spirit Fox to allow it to, however, instead of simply leaving which she could have easily done, Jargi decided that she would forever remain as a guardian to the kingdom and to the Queen's heirs.

And so it went that the Great Queen, who had ended the chaos that had once ruled the world the land, passed on to the next world and her daughter, Ayame, who had the same features as her mother, took the throne until the time came for her aswell to pass the throne on to her own daughter and down the centuries the throne was passed from daughter to red-haired daughter. Each ruler grew the hold of the kingdom by a bit more until it was a mighty empire, stretching as far as the the Grand Ocean to the East all the way to the Islands to the West, as far North as the Ice Mountains and as far South as the Endless Jungle.

Many centuries passed, then millennia, the Empire flourished, works of art were created, grand ideas were voiced, wonders were created, the world met an untold time of good fortune and prosperity.

But, nothing ever lasts forever.

It is unclear why or who exactly, but it is mostly agreed that one fateful night, a group of young but talented sorcerers were working on some kind of new spell when something went horribly wrong. The entire city, in a chain reaction that the world had never seen before the spell-gone-haywire began to feed off of the magical energy in the city and continued onward, in one single night, the thousand-year empire was completely destroyed.

Jargi, along with the Eight Imperial Guardians, as the eight-tailed Spirits and their human hosts were now called, were able to sense the blast just in time to protect only the queens personal chamber from the blast, doing so however, weakened them all immensely.

Hundreds of thousands died that night and thousands more perished in the aftermath. The Empress tried to restore order but with all of her officers in the Imperial City dead (she had been the only to survive the initial blast, even the human halves of the Imperial Guardians had been killed) she had little power to draw upon.

She managed build build up a makeshift town from the rubble and attempted to get survivors from all around to flock to it as a point from which to start over. The new city was just getting ot it's legs when a famine struck, out lying gangs of bandits took to raiding the new town for food and supplies.

People were starving, sick and desperate, therefore the also got very angry, a revolt began, first quietly then most of the village was screaming for the head of the Empress, with no choice left, she fled. The Heart of the Mother was one of the most powerful magical devices in existence, fearing someone might abuse it's power if they were able to take it from her, the Empress Uzamaki, for that was the name of the Empire, sealed it away inside of a scroll for she was a highly skilled sorceress as all Empresses were trained to be.

Time wore on, memory of the once-great empire faded into the blackness of history, all nine of those Great Spirits that had once saved the world from Evil were forced to pull themselves together into a single entity in order to survive after they were so weakened by the magical disaster. The imperial blood one continued on in secret, eventually the secrets of the Magical arts died away and with the the knowledge of how to unseal the scroll which contained the The Heart of the Mother.

The Great Spirits, lacking the purification that the so sorely needed in their weakened state, began to lose themselves to the confusion of chaos that was brought about by all of them joining into one being. Eventually they regained their strength but not their mind or personalities and became the creature known as the Ten-Tailed beast.

More hundreds of years went on and the Beast was destroyed and broken up by the Sage of the Six Paths, thus, the nine tailed beasts were born all still confused and altered by the corruption which had consumed them during the centuries past.

Five years ago I, Uzamaki Kushina, 123rd descendant of Mother Uzamaki, and heir to the thrown of the Great Uzamaki Empire, gave birth to Uzamaki Naruto, 124th descendant of Mother Uzamaki and the first ever male born into the line.

**So, that's the end, make sure to tell me what you thought, I'm open to any and all opinions, criticisms or praise! **

**Also I need a Beta reader if anyone wants to vollunteer.**


	5. Pride of the Prince

**I'm back! Sorry for taking so long to update, life life tends to get in the way of the things we enjoy but it's summer and I am determined to finish this thing before August so I hope you're all ready for a long haul!**

**Without further adieu I bring you, Chapter 4! **

** Pride of the Prince**

Naruto sat on his bed, his back leaning against the wall and his knees drawn up to his chest, thin arms hugging them tightly to himself. Brilliant, cerulean eyes gazed downward into nothing, covered by a veil of messy blond hair, the gentle patter of spring rain could be heard easily in the absolute silence that was the orphanage, all the other children were asleep in the much larger, group room which most of the foster-children within called home.

Naruto however, was given his own separate and much smaller room to himself, which might seem like a good deal at first glance but was actually a cunning scheme by the management to further isolate the young boy from any sort of connection with his peers.

Not only did he miss out on all the late-night whispering and suppressed giggles but it put a social barrier up as well, the children felt envious and annoyed at the blond getting his own room which caused them to outcast him from their various groups even during the daytime, this arrangement had always made Naruto feel so very lonely.

Now though, it felt so different, as he sat on his bed in his quiet, empty room with the steady sound of rainfall hitting the nearby window filling the empty space, still trying to digest all that had occured over the past four days, Naruto decided that having his own room was not lonely but lofty.

Suddenly overcome with energy, he leaped off of his bed and began to pace around his rather cramped living quarters. Flicking on the light switch he began to inspect his room with a look of assured disapproval. He was a prince after all, he thought to himself as his eyes roamed the cracked walls and old, squeaky floor boards.

As he walked he began to pay attention to himself, deciding that his posture did not fit one with blood as noble as his own, Naruto shifted himelf in order to make his back and shoulders straight and as regal as he could manage, he further decided that princes do not walk with their hands in their pockets nor do they allow said appendages to simply flail about as they walked.

After several shifts in position, the boy decided on holding his hands together, palm outwards behind his back, nodding in self-satisfaction, he continued to survey his living quarters with a growing expression of disapproval.

This was no place for a prince to sleep! The curtains were old, worn and pacthed with unmatching fabrics, the walls had cobwebs in their upper corners and the pain was peeling off in more places than he could count. His floors were old and winy, the wood was old and worn, knotted by time and long-dried water damage.

Granted there were certainly worse places to live but such living arrangements could not be aboded by the heir to the Uzamaki blood line, even in hiding as he was, the young boy decided that this was entirely unacceptable.

But what could he do about it?

After all, it wasn't as though _he _had any money, well none that he had access to at any rate, his father had told him that he had left a sizable inheritance for Naruto in the care of the Third Hokage.

That was it!

The boy decided that he would simply march up to the Hokage's office and demand more suitable living quarters, preferably on his own, and a servant or two certainly wouldn't hurt, it was _his _money after all.

With that decided, the young blond found that his energy seemed to have all rushed out of him as quickly as it had come, covering his mouth with one hand to stifle his yawn, he flicked off his light switch and climbed into bed.

Just before he laid down his head , Naruto gave his room one last disapproving eye before finally succumbing to sleep.

That morning found the young blond waking up bright and early in order to be the first one into the bathroom which he still shared with the rest of the children, a fact which used to delight him but now caused him mild annoyance. After taking a quick shower, despite it not being his scheduled shower time until that night, Naruto spent another ten minutes thoroughly brushing his teeth and tongue and then fifteen minutes trying to figure out what he could do with his hair.

He found that he rather liked the look of having his hair slicked straight back and settled for that. Taking a few extra minutes, the boy inspecting himself with a smirk of satisfaction in the cracked mirror and ignored the bangs on the old wooden door and demands that he hurry up so that his foster-siblings could also have a turn.

Fixing a stern, regal and cool expression onto his face, and checking the mirror to assure himself that he did in fact, look rather impressive, the boy briskly opened the door to the bathroom and glared disapprovingly at the shocked faces of the four girls and three boys who had gathered around the door.

"Making such a noise in the morning is expected of you low classes," he began evenly "but you should still learn to respect your betters." The children all stared at Naruto in absolute awe and seemed completely lost for words.

Suppressing a smile, he brushed past the boy in the front of the line and was just about to be on his way to his room when ho noticed that the children around him were gazing with rather shocked expressions, not at his face or his unusually tame hair, but quite a bit further South.

It was then that Naruto realised that he was still quite naked.

Of course, his first instinct was to blush furiously and run, mortified into his room before smalling his door and hiding from the inevitable uproar of laughter which would follow him. However, the young prince decided that such a thing would be undignified and simply carried on his walk after only missing half a beat.

Just as he was about to enter his room, the boy turned around to glare defiantly at his peers.

"What's wrong? Have you never saw a naked human before? But I'll admit my naked body's pretty nice so I can't blame you all for staring."

With that, Naruto entered his room and quickly shut the door before covering his face with both palms in complete mortification at what had just transpired. He could only hope that his response would result in awe and admiration rather than mock and ridicule, he was not optimistic though.

One hour and thirty-minutes later found Naruto, now entirely dressed in his best outfit, a only slightly worn black long-sleeve shirt and matching pants and sandals, entering the door to Hokage Tower and strolling in with what he sincerely hoped was complete confidence.

Another thirty minutes, several verbal altercations with various staff and shinobi within the tower, the boy's near arrest and a well timed arrival of one Sarutoi Hizuren later found Naruto sitting with a carefully blank face, looking into the eyes of his savior.

Several moments passed before the Third Hokage finally broke the silence with a pleasant smile and a puff of his pipe.

"Naruto, my boy, what brings you here today that was so urgent you felt the need to refer to a member of my staff as a..."snot-filled, douche rag, commoner"? I didn't think that our appointment was until Friday."

Holding back a snort of laughter at the sound of the old man quoting his, admittedly vulgar insult, Naruto decided to get right to the point. "Hokage-sama, I want my own apartment. On the good side of town, a servant or two wouldn't be bad either."

_"Hmmm,just as blunt as his mother, and from the look on that face, probably just as stubborn. But why in the world would he suddenly be asking for a change in living arrangements? On top of that, this is just after he disappeared for nearly a whole week before being found in the forest by an ANBU operative and claimed to have just been "camping". Something is not right."_

Sarutobi measured his next words as carefully before speaking, already feeling the first signs of anger and indignation creeping into his blood.

"Naruto, this sudden behavior, has anyone at the orphanage been...mistreating you in anyway? You need not be afraid of them punishing you for telling, just say the word and I'll have some-"

"Please don't misunderstand Hokage-sama!" Naruto cut in the moment he realised what the man was getting at."It's nothing like child-abuse or anything. I just decided that.." Here, the young boy raised himself from his chair and walked around the desk to where he was only a foot away from where the Hokage was sitting before continuing.

"I just decided that the son of the Fourth Hokage and the Jinchikuri of the Nine Tailed Demon Fox should have his own apartment at least. Especially since I'm rich."

Blinking several times in order to gather his thoughts, Sarutobi Hizuren could think of only one thing to respond with. "I think you mean "Jinchuuriki", not Jinchuriki."

"Yes, that."

After Naruto revealed his knowledge of that portion of his past, he was forced to give an edited version of what actually happened during his mysterious four-day disappearance to the old man. After which the Hokage agreed to spend a portion of his inheritance on a moderately up-scale apartment only a few blocks away from the Tower.

He also agreed to an increased monthly stipend to afford the boy all of his newly-found expensive tastes, to ensure that the boy did not spend all of his money on ridiculous things and to act as his guardian, Sarutobi commissioned a retired ex-chuunin to be the boys assistant until he was twelve years old.

And that is how Uzamaki Naruto the orphan became Uzamaki Naruto, the brat prince...who was also an orphan.

**TIME SKIP NO JUITSU!**

**3 years later...**

It was a pleasant, sunny afternoon at Konoha ninja academy and all the little ninja-in-training were lined up in front of the target practice area for kunai and shuriken training. Most of the children were chatting animatedly amongst themselves, boasting and wagering the way that only 8 year olds can, only two children remained silent and stoic.

The first was the class #1, prodigy and sole survivor of the Uchiha Massacre, Sasuke Uchiha who leaned stoically against a tree his hands in his pockets and his face brooding.

Second was eight year Uzamaki Naruto, ranked #15 in the class, village pariah, spoiled, entitled, brat, son of the Fourth Hokage and sole heir to the Uzamaki blood line. He stood a ways apart from the rest of the children, spinning a practice shuriken around his index finger, his face held a carefully blank expression.

Finally, the call came for everyone to line up and take their positions to begin the ranking test for kunai and shuriken skill. A list which Sasuke was number one in and Naruto was number three, the young blond was determined to change that.

Umino Iruka, the classes home room teacher stepped out to the side of the practice field and called out the first ten participants, the list was called from the lowest ranked students up so the first 10 were the number seventy through the number sixty.

Most people only half paid attention to the lower ranking students, in the ninja academy, ones ranking was roughly equivalent to ones popularity, in most cases so ranking tests were always minded by the student body but the bottom ten usually didn't change by anything significant so it was not considered particularly worth while.

After nearly thirty minutes, the top ten were finally called, everyone, with the exception of Nara Shikamaru and Akimichi Chouji was paying close attention.

Iruka-sensei called the names in descending order:

"Takezo Bin

Aburame Shino

Hyuuga Hinata

Hezo Kazuma

Harumi Tenshi

Ryo Hagase

Inuzaka Kiba

Uzamaki Naruto

Yamanaka Ino

Uchiha Sasuke

Approach the throwing line!"

All the participant's faces held competitive determination, besides Hinata's which held more of a terrified trepidation at the thought of being watched by so many of her peers, Shino'a face was unreadable. But he pushed his glasses up in a way that his parents would have known meant his was slightly nervous.

There were various thoughts going through each participant's mind.

_"Awww shit, this is the only thing that I'm good at, I can't afford to lose my place on the top ten!" _(Bin)

_"There is a slight eastward blowing wind, I'll have to adjust my throws accordingly." _(Shino)

_"So...many...people...what if I fail?..What if father finds out that I failed!" _(Hinata)

_"Heh, I'm gonna kick Kiba's ass this time and he'll have to pay me 20 ryos!" _(Kazuma)

_"There's no way I can beat Sasuke or Ino but if I can take Naruto's third place then I'll move up to #9 over-all!" _(Tenshi)

_"This is boring, why does eveyone make a big deal out of this shit, it's easy as hell." _(Hagase)

_"There's no way im losing to that lazy-ass Hagase, I'm takin' Naruto's ranking and that's all there is to it!" _(Kiba)

_"Damn it! I'm the fucking prince, why the hell do I keep losing to these damn peons! I'll definetly beat you this time, Sasuke!" _(Naruto)

_"Hmmm, I haven't been training my weapon throwing lately so I probably won't be able to beat Sasuke, wow! His hair looks really nice today..." _(Ino)

_"..." _(Sasuke)

The whistle blew and each student started off with their kunai, aiming first twenty, then thirty, then fifty metres away. Five kunai for each distance, Sasuke led with a perfect 340, Ino trailed with 322, Hagase was in third with 320 and Naruto and Kiba were tied for fouth with both having scored 306.

Exclamations were heard at Sasuke beating his own record arguments broke out amongst the on-lookers over weather or not he would be able to throw a perfect all around set. That would put him at the required level of an academy graduate.

The finally everyone had finished their throws and were preparing to begin the shuriken throw, much more difficult to throw longer distances due to their tendency to change with the wind, proper understanding of how to change with the wind yourself was needed for accuracy.

**(Naruto's POV)**

_Goddamnit! Shit! Fuck! Motherfucking shit storm bastards! Why? Why do I keep fucking losing to these worthless peons! Aren't I a prince? Aren't I the son of the Fourth Hokage? Aren't I the hero of Konohagakure! I'm strong! I'm great! All these fucking people who glare at me like or pretend I don't exist, they all do it 'cause they don't understand! They don't know how great I am! So...why...why am I always losing? Why am I so weak! No! I'm not weak! I'll win, I'll teach all of these bastards to know their place!"_

As Iruka sensei readied himself to blow the whistle, Naruto picked up his shuriken and readied himself, going over everything he knew about throwing in his head.

_"Definetly" _he thought to himself "_this time...I definitely won't lose this time!"_

The whistle blew, the ninja-in-training threw.

_"Concentrate"_

Naruto narrowed his mind so that his entire world only existed of the shuriken, the wind and the target.

_"Relax"_

He let all of the tension out of his shoulders and neck, loosening his entire body so that each throw could have the snap of a whip.

_"Win!"_

The final shuriken struk its target and the whistle was blown, Iruka-sensei stepped out to announce the scores.

"First place, Uchiha Sasuke, score: 678

Second place, Ryo Hagase, score: 665

Third place, Yamanaka Ino, score: 664

Fourth place, Uzamaki Naruto, score: 662

Fifth place, Inuzaka Kiba, score: 652

Sixth place, Aburame Shino, score: 650

Seventh place, Haruno Sakura, score: 632

Eighth place, Takezo Bin, score: 629

Ninth place, Nara Shikamaru, score: 615

Tenth place, Harumi Tenshi, score: 612

..."

The list continued on for seventy more participants but many people stopped paying attention after the top ten were called except to hear their own scores, Naruto had left long before that.

It was two weeks after that event and Uchiha Sasuke was taking his usual route to his apartment from the academy. The sun was hovering just over the horizon, bathing the entire sky in brilliant hues of orange, gold, red and pink, there was a gentle wind blowing through and the crisp Autumn air brought with it the colors of the golden forest.

As he walked, Sasuke noted that he found Konoha to be rather beautiful in the Autumn, surprising himself with the fact that he still noticed such things and he felt his mood take on a very unusual lightness.

Happiness was an emotion which the young Uchiha was quite sure he would never truly feel again but one might have described his mood at this particular moment in time to be nearly content. However such things are fleeting as Sasuke discovered once again when he noticed a figure with a patch of painfully blond hair and brilliant blue eyes standing in his path, clearly looking for a fight.

Sasuke, not particularly feeling like a fight at that moment, decided he would simply make to walk past his class mate, to his surprise, Naruto did nothing to prevent him from doing so. He had gotten nearly five paces away when the other boy finally spoke.

"Fight me, Sasuke-san"

Said Uchiha stopped his progress and turned his head to see that the blond hadnt even moved, but there was no question as to what he said. Suddenly Sasuke felt like he wanted to teach this arrogant ass-hole a lesson, no one else dared to challenge the last surviving Uchiha so directly and he decided that he would teach the blond headed nuisance exactly why that was.

"I don't mind, as long as you don't mind having your ass handed to you...15th place."

That seemed to be the proverbial straw which breaks the proverbial camel's back because at that statement, Naruto snapped into action with eyes that promised every single layer of hell.

Spinning on a dime, he struck with a left hook aimed for Sasuke's temple, the Uchiha easily dodged the punch and countered with his own right straight, directly to the blonds temple, before said blond could be knocked back by the solid blow, the Uchiha grabbed his shirt and pulled him into a very painful knee the the gut.

The jinchuuriki's eyes widened in shock and pain before being interupted by a well placed upward palm-strike, courtesy of Uchiha Sasuke. With that, Naruto was allowed to finally fall to the ground, head reeling from pain and shock.

"Is that it?" The Uchiha asked. "That was embarrassingly easy, I thought you were a little stronger than that with how youre always walking around like you're hot shit. Guess you're really all talk after all." Turning to leave, he managed four steps towards his destination when he suddenly discovered what if felt like to be hit in the back by ninety-two pound of very pissed off blond.

Quick to capitalise on his advantage, Naruto grabbed Sasuke's hair and proceeded to lift if off of the ground only to slam it rather viciously back into the gravel. He prepared to do so again until he suddenly noticed that a pair of feet had somehow gotten around his neck, he was allowed just enough time to be puzzled before his head was brought backwards quite painfully into the ground by said feet.

Rolling to his feet, Naruto sprang on the rising Uchiha without taking even a second to appreciate the exquisite pain which pulsed through his entire body at this point. However just when he was within punching distance he noticed that his adversary was holding his hand in an extremely ominous way in front of his mouth.

"_Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu!"_

Suddenly the most intense pain which he had ever felt spread throughout Naruto's body, he was enshrouded in heat and pain, his entire universe became about only pain and heat, on some level of consciousness that still remained, the boy was distantly aware of his body hitting the ground.

"Rule number six for a shinobi: never charge at an opponent when you cant see their hands. Especially if you have no idea of what he can do, you lose, idiot."

Somehow the word "idiot" was enough to catch the blonde's attention in order to bring him back to the world of the conscious. Opening his yes, he saw the Uchiha beginning to walk away, as quickly as he could, he climbed painfully and very shakily to his feet.

"Wait." he called to an unresponsive back. "I SAID FUCKING WAIT!" This seemed to have gotten the other boys attention as the back finally stopped, though it did not turn around.

"Please...tell me..." Narutp struggled with his body to stay both on his feet and conscious enough to speak. It would have been so much easier if he simply allowed himself to sink to his knees but his pride would not allow him to do such a thing.

He stood, panting, what was left of his shirt still smoking and the smell of burnt fabric and skin wafting through the air, it was unbelievably difficult just to draw breath, speech seems impossible, he spoke anyways.

"Tell me...why...how...how are you so strong? Why...someone like you...why is their such a huge difference between us!" Already Naruto was feeling stronger, breathing was becoming easier, his legs were ever so slightly more supportive."I train, my bloodline is a good one, so what makes you so fucking strong!"

He glared at the young Uchiha's back, for several moments, the dusky wind blew golden and red leaves through the air, finally, the other boy spoke.

"The difference between us? Why am I strong? You should instead ask yourself, why are _you _so _weak?_"

The blond's eyes widened in shock at these words, that he had asked himself that same question for years only made the blow that much harder to take.

"What do you mean?" He asked, "it isn't like I don't train just as much as everyone else! More probably, I stay after school for two hours everyday just to train!"

Then the back became the front and Naruto found himself suddenly looking directly into the obsidian eyes of one Sasuke Uchiha, and they were getting closer, fast.

"Two hours hours throwing kunai and you call that training? I've seen your half-assed way of training. The way you carry around the stupid fucking hankercheif in your sleeve so that no one sees you sweat. How you never over exert yourself so that no one sees you struggling. That's all you do too, I hear people talk about how you go around the shopping district actin all high and mighty just because the Hokage-sama happens to like you.

You walk around with your nose in the air just so you can look down at others like your some kind of hot shit and then everyday people see how you're nothing but talk. What do you know about struggle? What do you know about pain? You're weak 'cause you don't have any resolve, I can see it in your eyes, your someone who thinks they're entitled to something and has never had to work for anything.

I whiny ass pussy like you, with no resolve and no goal, who the fuck would lose to someone like you? You lack strength because, you are too prideful to really go after it. You wanna be strong? You gotta crawl through dirt and shit, bring yourself to the lowest depths you can possibly reach, live an existence where all you think of is that ambition and what you must do to achieve it.

Not that a spoiled, rich boy, bitch like you could ever do something like that."

And with that, Sasuke Uchiha walked off and Naruto finally allowed his knees to fall to the ground.

**And that's chapter 4! I'll definitely be updating soon, sooner if I get a lot of comments *hint hint***


	6. Author Explains

**Just a bit of catching up.**

Ok so I think I should take this opportunity to explain a few things.

1. Naruto is NOT becoming a Sauke clone. -Every single action which I have Naruto or any other character do is justified by the plot. The reason why Naruto turned into such a douche is given in the summary of the story. Sometime around the age of 5ish in the canon Naruto, he decides to become an obnoxious clown/prankster as a coping mechanism for being outcast by those around him. In my version he meets his parents and if you read chapter three you will have seen this nice little segment wherin Minato basically tells Naruto that he is the hottest thing since shoe strings in order to help heer him up. That is why, in order to bare the burden of everyone in the village pretending he doesnt exist, Naruto decides to think "I am their protector, I am a prince so it's my duty to bare whatever burden I must for the sake of my people."

However, seeing as Naruto has no idea what a prince should act like and given the fact that he's a little kid, he simply turns into a brat who walks around with a stick up his ass and the idea that he's better than everyone else. Also why he is so tormented by his weakness, because his father and mother both told him that he's strong so like any child he takes that as the gospel so he can't really understand how he can possibly be weak.

In short, he is a stuck up ass hole because he chose the pride of a prince over the laugh of a clown.

2. Alot more than what I showed happened in the cave with his parents but because it would take about two more chapters just to get done with it, which would severely hamper story progression, I'm just gonna put the more important parts in as flashbacks when the plot allows/needs it for explanation.

3. Just so you all know, there is no fixed coupling in the fic. This is not a romance fic but there WILL be romance however it's going to be alot of swtiching and turning just like in real life. If you're looking for that sickeningly mushy Twilight shit, go elsewhere.

If you have any more questions, please feel free to ask them in a comment and I'll be sure to get back to you.


	7. Resolve

**Chapter 5**

**Resolve**

The boy was not sure how long he sat there, staring blankly ahead, his knees growing sore on the hard ground, the sun shining its last magenta rays into the sky as it reached its finaly decent. The fall wind whistled quietly on, all was quiet in the world of Uzamaki Naruto.

_"What do you know about struggle? What do you know about pain?" _What a bad joke, all his life had ever been was pain!

_"You're weak 'cause you don't have any resolve, I can see it in your eyes, you're someone who thinks they're entitled to something and has never had to work for anything!"_

"What the fuck do you know? You bastard." Naruto growled to himself, anger, hate and pity welling up inside of him, all of it directed inward. "Of course I think I'm entitled to stuff, I'm a prince dammit! My dad's the Fourth Hokage, hero of Konoha! The Hell does he know about working for stuff? All my life I have to live with the scorn and hatred of the village that I save every fucking day!

Why don't you try it, huh! Yeah I act like I'm better than everyone 'cause I am! If I wasn't..." the blond paused his tirade to swallow the lump that was beginning to grow in his throat, his clenched fist trembled at his sides. "...If I wasn't better than all these fuckin' villagers there's be know way that I could handle that every day and not be miserable!

I'm given my space 'cause I'm a hero! And the son of hero, a prince's gotta stand above everyone else...otherwise...otherwise, he's just alone" Naruto fell forward, his arms coming up to keep his body from hitting the ground. Now on all fours, the boys head hung down as he glared hatefully at the ground.

_"I whiny ass pussy like you, with no resolve and no goal, who the fuck would lose to someone like you? You lack strength because, you are too prideful to really go after it. You wanna be strong? You gotta crawl through dirt and shit...Not that a spoiled, rich boy, bitch like you could ever do something like that."_

"Yeah," he began softly, speaking to the wind. "I'm a weakling right now, a dumb ass who thought he was hot shit just 'cause of his parents. Always walkin' around thinkin' that my blood is enough, that being a prince is enough.

Yeah, that was stupid, both my parents are dead so I'm not prince, I'm a king! A king can't worry about shit like his image or what people think of him." Finally Naruto began to feel the stirring of an old energy that he hadn't felt in quite sometime deep within himself.

Slowly. he began to rise to his feet, trailing his fingers along the ground as he did so. "The only thing a king can worry about is becoming strong, he has to face reality and shape his own destiny!"

Finally, he was on his feet, his eye shone with steely determination as he reached under his waist line and pulled at a kunai he had been planning on using against Sasuke after he had him pinned down just to see him beg for mercy. Bringing his empty hand out in front of him, he brought the land down in a quick slash across his palm, he winced briefly at the pain but made no sound.

"On this wound and my own imperial blood, I do swear to become the strongest shinobi The Village Hidden in the Leaves has ever produced. I will become strong enough to reunite the entire land and restore the glory of my family's empire, not matter what the cost!"

The blood dripped steadily form the boy's closed fist, each drop making a small splash as it hit the ground, quickly being absorbed into the dry dirt. He looked outwards toward the sky, revelling in the brilliance of the setting sun.

"Mother, father, it's the promise of a lifetime."

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"Speed it up, brat! I've seen slugs with more hustle than you're showing, you wanna become Hokage like that? My grandma could out-run you and she's dead!'

Naruto quickened his pace, even as his bosy screamed for a break, it felt as though his legs would quit on him at any second, though to be fair, his legs had felt like that virtually every day for the past 5 months, they had only actually collapsed on two occasions.

_"This is definitely his twisted way of getting revenge for the past three years, twisted old fart. Maybe next time he goes in for his bath I'll-"_

"Enough suicides, gimme some push ups, fifty of 'em and I want 'em done right! I want you to three seconds on the up and the down and you better let me hear you counting!"

This was very much how Naruto's days had been spent ever since he had come home late and begged his guardian, Ueyama Bari, to train him. The old man had been heavily reluctant at first, claiming that the boy was simply to soft to handle the kind of training he had to offer.

The blond was determined though and spent three days sitting in front of the man's room without any food and only minimal water, in the end though, it was the sheer passion and resolve held in the boy's eyes which finally convinced Bari to drill the brat in with everything he knew.

Honestly, Bari had never been quite sure what to make of the boy, having been the assistant of both the Third and Fourth Hokages, he never thought for a second that Naruto was some kind of reincarnation of the Fox itself. He h, however, spent three rather miserable years acting as the guardian to a boy who chose to repress all of his feelings of loneliness by acting as though he chose it.

For a while he was even wandering if the boy actually beleived all that stuff he kept spouting about being a prince and that he was simply better than everyone else, which was why people left him alone.

Then, out of nowhere, the brat suddenly got it in his head that he needed to become strong at all costs and so, here they were. Bari wiped the sweat accumulating along his head with his sleeve as he marveled at the surprising git he had seen from the kid.

It had been his own belief that Naruto would quit after at most, a week of the training, instead, the boy had actually complained the the older man was going too easy on him! Well, the kid couldn't complain since was getting what he had asked for, Bari thought to himself with a smile.

For first month. they had simple drilled to get the blond into proper shape and to see where he was at, now they were working on the specific area which the older man decided Naruto need the most help with, which was, of course. his chakra control, the exercise he was currently doing was just the physical routine needed to stay in shape.

"Bari-sensei! I've finished my push-ups!" The boy, though dripping with sweat seemed to be nowhere near as tired as an eight year old who had just done twenty pull-ups, two-hundred sit-ups, twenty straight minutes of high-intensity cardio, 5 kilometers worth of suicides and then fifty, painfully slow push ups.

However, Bari was used to be boys freakish stamina and was thankful for it, it gave him a serious edge when it came to training, especially because his body's muscles did not seem to need any rest period and improved at an astounding rate. After only the first month they had gotten Naruto's body to the peak level of fitness for a child of his age, that the boy was now on a strict diet regiment also seemed to help.

"Alright, brat! Now go sit on that rock and do your chakra training, and I swear to any god tha's listeiing to me right now, if you dont get that damn thing to stick for at least two hours straight we'll be walking home on three legs, you on two, me hoppin' on one 'cause my other will be up your ass!"

"Hai! Bari-sensei!" "Like I haven't been trying dammit! I'd like to sit your fat-ass try to sit on this fucking rock and try to mold chakra on your forehead for two hours straight."

"Hustle!"

Naruto straightened from his slouch and bolted off at a print towards the stone which had become a second home to him over the past two months. Bari yawned, begging his routine trek to Ichiraku's for lunch.

_"He's definately getting there." _the man thought to himself, creating a bunshin to make sure the boy felt he was being watched. "_that damned Nine Tails really screwed up the brats chakra control, but then, he gave the kid ridiculous amounts of it to compensate. If we can give the kid even average-level control he'd be a force to be reckoned with. He's already about average for his age though, what I want is to make his control upper-genin level, with that, who knows what he's be able to do?"_

As he arrived a his favorite ramen stall, Bari felt a sense of excitement and anticipation what he hadn't felt since he retired from teaching as the academy eight years ago. A feeling associated with seeing a student with unusually large amounts of potential, no student of his had ever made him feel like this, however.

_"That damn brat's going to be great one day, no question about it, I don't think I've ever seen such a little ball of pure, unfettered potential. He's got the works alright, all the basic stats for a class A ninja, but greatness is something that comes from something else. And I've never met anyone with as much of that "something else" as Uzamaki Naruto."_

Naruto's POV

The leaf was much easier to contain on his head then it had been in the beginning, but even so, it definitely wasn't easy, the damn thing kept slipping and then Naruto would have to release a burst of chakra just to keep it from escaping!

He was getting the hang of it though, for a week it seemed like he was finally getting the knack of keeping his chakra pumping out in a consistent stream, without any sudden breaks in the wave, the "slips" were coming at farther and farther intervals.

Annoying as it was, the blond knew it was what he needed, he had always had trouble focusing and his chakra control was terrible at best, this training took care of both, the only thine he had to say about it was that he really didn't have much more to accomplish.

When would he ever need to keep his chakra flowing at a steady stream for five hours? Well, that was the stipulation for completiong of his chakra control training before they got to get onto the promised ninjutsu training. With that happy thought, Naruto closed his mind off to the outside world and began to focus on his chakra.

Deeper deeper he delved into himself, soon he became conscious of the welcoming pool pf warmth the was the center of his chakra circulatory system. Diving in, he became aware of the hundreds of branches, sending out and bringing in constant streams of his own charka, and the there was that spot on his head where he was holding the leaf.

Suddenly, the boy became curiously aware of a strange pulsing coming from what felt like the very center of his chakra "pool". Focusing his concentration almost entirely inward, Naruto brought his full attention to the strange inner pulse, drawing his senses further and further in, he realised that it was a tiny, spinning, circular vortex which seemed to be the absolute origin of all his chakra.

Marveling at the idea, the young blond began to focus onto it completely, it took quite some time and much concentration but finally he was able to get a mental hold of it. Using all of his control, he prodded it to spin faster, to his surprise, it did, as it did so, he felt a sudden blast of power and energy which had had never felt before, it only lasted a moment before the tiny chakra vortex settled into its normal speed.

Now, more confidentally, the boy caused the vortex to spin faster, to unpleasing results. It seemed his inner vortex of power was not spining in as random a fashion as he at first thought it was but in a pattern of swirls and counter swirls.

Concentrating completely on the point, the blond simply observed its frantic torrential spinning until, slowly, he began to see the pattern, he brought his focus in deeper, and deeper, until he couls feel the points movement, Naruto became the point.

Finally, once he became entirely one with his vortex, he caused it to speed up, slowly at first, and then faster. The energy and power came back full force, faster, and faster he pushed it, curious as to where the limit was and it almost seemed like there was none, he just kept prodding the vortex and its spin became more furious, soon it took on a life of it's own and the boy barely had to prod it for the vortex and became more and more powerful.

It was the most wondeful feeling in his life, just to see what would happen, Naruto drew the ball in, making the point even smaller whilst still keeping it's accelleration going at full force, the results were amazing! The spin became even greater, his ears filled with the rush of energy, still the vortex showed no sign of stopping it's progress, overwhelmed with the sheer joy of it all, the young blond let out a scream of pure ecstasy.

It felt absolutely amazing, its was pure bliss, Naruto thought to himself that he wouldnt particularly mind dying like this, it was the most wonderful thing he had ever experienced, becoming completely lost in this world of eternal swirling and energy!

However, his ride was quite rudely and suddenly interrupted by a very painful shock, jolting so hard that he fell off of his rocky perch Naruto's eyes shot open at the same time as his mouth in order to voice a rather vocal protest.

"Goddamnit what's you're fuckin prob-..."

He found he rather forgot what he was saying when he noticed that there was a very strange crowd in front of him. To the right was Bari, which was to to be expected, but then there was the Hokage standing directly in front of where the child had just been a moment before, besides him was what appeared to be a small squad of ANBU operatives as well as nearly a dozen random shinobi.

Naruto was confused, what confused him even more was that he was not on a rock as he thought he was, but sitting on a stool in the Hokage's office, rather, he had been before falling out of it.

Even more strange was the expression that everyone seemed to be wearing, one of complete shock and disbelief, even the Hokage looked absolutely incredulous. Then Naruto decided that his curiosity simply could not handle the suspense any more and he was never going to get any answers from silence.

"Errrr," he began uncertainly, "what's everyone looking at?"

While the boy was not certain what to expect as a reply, given the already bizarre nature of the situation, what happened next was certainly not what he had been expecting. It was the Hokage who spoke first, and his speech was short indeed.

"Everyone besides Bari-san, Kakashi-kun and Naruto-kun, leave, now." It did not seem as though anyone was in the mood to test his patience because the order was followed with an almost absurd amount of haste.

After the three seconds it took for the room to become quite empty, Naruto, feeling as though he had waited long enough for answers, decided to phrase his question a bit more forefully.

"Hokage-sama," he began respectfully "can you please tell me what the fuck is going on?"

The one to answer was not the Third Hokage, however, it was a tall, white haired, jounin with a mask covering the large majority of his face. The blond figured that this man was probably "Kakashi-kun".

"Naruto-kun, what exactly is the last thing that you remember?" The man spoke in a rather lasy-sounding, monotone that seemed to express a complete disinterest in the entire situation.

Naruto was still rather non-plussed, but chose to answer anyways. "Hmmmm, well Bari-sensei told me to practice my charka control as usual and then I dove into my chakra like I always did before a-"

"What do you mean, you "dove into your chakra?" interrupted the Hokage.

"Well, I just ummm, focused and then I sort of turn my eyes inside and sort of feel my chakra but it feels more like I'm seeing it, you know? Anyways, I dove into my chakra like I had been for the past two days cause, it's pretty interesting and I figured it'd help my control and then I felt this weird pulse-wave thingy.

So I had to focus really hard and then I found it and I made it spin faster, only then I made it spin too fast so I had to kinda become focused wayy on it so that I felt like I was the ball thingy and then I made it spin faster and faster and then someone shocked me and now..I'm here."

The blond finished lamely, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. Several moments ticked by as each of them men exchanged meanigful glances. Finally, the elderly, salt and pepper haired, slightly portly man known as Bari broke the silence. His usually rather gravelly voice now had a strange softness to it.

"Naruto...when I told you to work on your chakra exercises...that was almost four days ago. You've been in a trance the entire time, around six hours ago you started emitting huge amounts of chakra and creating some kind of ckakra ball with you inside of it. The ball got thicker and thicker and started spinning so fast that you were levitating for Mira's sake!"

"That "shock" you felt was caused my an A-class chakra disrpution seal that I had to create just for you." Sarutobi jumped in. "I have never seen such an extraordinary amount of chakra come from a human being in my entire life, though I do know now, what happened to you, it was as I expected. You found the center of your chakra, you probably already realise that, what you may not realise is that this is something that usually is only ever managed by jounin with years of experience.

In the world of shinobi there are three ways to measure ones chakra ability, the first is sheer amount, that is, how much chakra ones body can produce. The second is chakra control, or, ones ability to control ones chakra with precision and accuracy. In order to obtain even genin status, it is necessary to at least have a grasp of these two basic measurements. The third, is chakra awareness, it is something that we all have at some level but which typically does not reach a significant enough level to make a difference until a a ninja reaches a rather high level.

You seem to have what is known as "natural chakra awareness", that means that you have an innate awareness of the movement and behavior of your spiritual and physical energy. This typically would only mean that you have a rather decent edge when it comes to summoning up the necessary chakra for a technique, though most genin level techniques don't require enough chakra to make a real difference.

But you, Naruto-kun, also happen to have a rather ridiculous amount of chakra, right now those two things don't really add up to much but eventually it will lend itself to making you a rather interesting shinobi. Just try not to get yourself lost inside you chakra core again, had we not woken you up you would have eventually used up all of your chakra and probably died, as it is, you must be having trouble standing."

Naruto however, didn't hear this last part as he had already lost consciousness.

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_2 years later_

_Naruto stood, facing the man who had been his teacher, guardian and friend for the past five years of his life. Bari looked back at the child, his face serious and calculating._

_"Uzamaki Naruto!"_

_"Hai, Bari-sensei!"_

_"Today is the day that culminates all of your hard work over the past three years, today we shall see if all the blood and sweat which you have given to your training will reap the results we've trained for. Weather or not you succeed today, I have nothing left to teach you, however, if you fail, as promised, you must give up being a ninja. Do you understand?"_

_"Hai!"_

_"Then, do it, pass the insurmountable wall and rise to greatness, show me what you're capable of with hard-work, Naruto!"_

_The man and the boy held each other's gazes, the boy with grim determination, and the man warry confidence._

_"Brat, do it now!" The brown haired man yelled, putting all of his hope and spirit behind it as though that would somehow help._

_Confidently, the young boy placed his hands together in an all too familiar seal. Gathering his chakra as carefully as he could, he felt for the perfect swirl and spin, he knew that he needed to get this exactly perfect. Throw all of his will-power and concentration behind it, he yelled the words which had haunted his dreams since he had learned them._

_"Bunshin no Juitsu!"_

_There was no smoke, no explosion of chakra, the wind rustled through the leaves of the surrounding forest, causing the spring grass to dance to it's whilsteling tune just as before._

_The only difference was that now, there seemed to be several hundred Narutos standing on the grass as well._

_The old man grinned at the crowd of blond hair, he wasn't surprised of course, after all Naruto had completed his training on that technique two weeks ago, it was still good to see him manage it now that their time together was at an end._

_With a quiet "poof" and a cloud of smoke, the chakra constructs dissapeared from view and once again there was only the man and the boy in the empty training ground that had become a home to them both._

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Uzamaki Naruto and Ueyama Bari now sat together at a ramen stand known as Ichiraku's waiting for their order, Bari with anticipation, Naruto with trepidation.

"Hey, Bari-san" the boy began petulantly, "ramen is a peasant food and it's not even part of my diet, why do we have to eat here for celebration?"

"Idiot!" the man's insult was directly followed by a sharp blow to his pupil's head. "Ichiraku ramen is the food of gods! Besides which, how can a king rule his people if he does not know his people? Just try it, kid, you'll like it!"

The blond's retort was interrupted by the arrival of two large bowls of ramen being set in front of them by an attractive, brown haired, teenage girl who gave Naruto a rather sharp look as she set down his order.

"Two bowls of "peasant" food made just for you, your highness." She said venomously before turning away with a huff. The young blond looked questioningly at Bari before grabbing his chopsticks and sweetly responding to the serving girl.

"Why thank you, Oba-chan, I was beggining to get a little peckish, I was wondering if maybe your hip had given out on you." As he laughed inwardly at his own wit, Naruto was careful to keep the sweetest, most innocent smile that he could muster as the now red-faced serving girl rounded on him.

His face still a mask of innocence, the boy hastily dug into the bowl of ramen with the expectation that he would not particularly enjoy it. His tongue had tasted and sampled the most refined dishes in all of the most expensive restaurants in Konoha, as he had always had a fast metabolism, eating had become one of his few luxuries and he considered himself to be somewhat of a connesiuer.

As the noodles entered his mouth, carrying with them a healthy amount of broth, vegetables and beef, the boy carefully measured each sensation brought about by the noodles.

"Hmmm, the noodles have an interesting consistency, not quite as firm as I would typically prefer but not soggy either...they seem to have absorbed the broth unusually well but are still holding their texture. The meat and vegetables counter balance each other perfectly, it's a strong yet smooth taste. The broth itself is tailored perfectly to the noodles and additives, strong yet still giving plenty of room for the food's natural flavor to come out.

The spices are interesting as well, I can place most of them but there must be some personalized mixture he placed in it to give it this extraordinary taste. This ramen it's...its...dear gods this is the best thing I've ever tasted!"

Bari observed the young boy with interest, he had seen that blank, calculating face on his charge before. Many restaurant chefs had found their prides completely ruined after seeing just such a face, though Naruto himself didn't know it, his opinion when it came to food was held in rather high esteem by Konoha's gourmet community.

Bari smiled to himself when he noticed the boy's right eye brow raise almost imperceptibly, a twitch of his given only when he found a dish to be spectacularly delicious. After his first bite, Naruto continued to eat his ramen with the same unreadable expression, barely even slurping his noodles, his pace was consistent and rather fast.

In a few minutes, both the man and the boy had finished their meals and set their bowls down to let the store owner, who was busy with a pot of broth, know they had finished. It was the girl who gathered the bowls and the payment, however, her gaze still locked on the blond.

Said blond was still merely sitting at his chair, his eyes locked on the man stirring busily away at the ramen. Just as the cook seemed satisfied enough with the broth to return the top onto the pot, the boy spoke up.

"Pardon me, oji-san, what is your name?" The tone of his voice was completely serious and almost challenging.

"Hmm? The names Ichiraku Teuchi, did you like the ramen?" The middle-aged man approached Naruto from behind the counter, wondering what in the world could have been wrong with the ramen to put such a look into the kid's eyes.

Without another word, the blond got up from his stool and began to walk off calling back only that he would remember the name and then giving his own.

"I'm Uzamaki Naruto, remember that."

Ayame stared between the boy and her father who himself had suddenly taken on a very grim expression.

"Ummm, father...what just happened?"

"That boy, I've seen that look before, it's the look given by one chef as a challenge to another. We'll be seeing him again." With that he turned away, tending to his ingredients with a new flame, "I haven't been challenged like that in a long time, let's see what you've got, brat."

Meanwhile, poor Ayame was still trying to figure out exactly what had happened.

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**So that's chapter Chapter 5...this chapter really only served to explain how Naruto gets to basic level on strength and no, he is not Super Naruto. Right now he is still quite a bit weaker than Sasuke. Honestly, I'm not too happy with this chapter but trust me, it will get alot better!**

**Next chapter will see some real story and character progression with people other than Naruto! So yay for that and such.**

**If you enjoyed this fic, or ever if you didn't I would suggest you all check out the rather awesome fic I found whilst perusing the site.**

.net/s/4976492/1/Fuzzy_Logic

**Btw, I could REALLY use a BETA reader...yeah _**

**That's all my lovelies, make sure to review, wether you liked it or not. Please and thanks. ^_^**


	8. The Girls

** The Girls**

Ino Yamanaka woke from her slumber with a luxurious stretch. Her long, platinum blonde hair cascaded over her face as she curled herself into a ball, savoring the last few moments of bed time before she was forced to rise. The girl stayed in a rather decent sized room on the top floor of her parent's three-story house with one large window looking out toward the forest to the East so that she could always watch the sun-rise from her queen-sized canopy bed. She had recently convinced her parents into redecorating her room into what she thought was more sophisticated and lady-like then it's previous bright pink. Her walls were a gentle lavender with midnight-blue borders and a white ceiling decorated with pictures of tulips, blue poppies and white lilies. Her bed-spread was a subtle violet affair along with white sheets with the frame and over-head being pure white.

Ino often liked to fancy herself a princess from within the confines of this room and her full sized vanity made of pure ivory, an inheritance from her great-grandmother, made it all too easy to do so. Sleepily, she rose from her bed and made her way into her bathroom which was all black tile and granite floors and appliances with white walls and ceiling to get ready for the day.

After brushing her teeth, bathing, taking a shower, applying lotion to her entire body, doing her hair, re-doing her hair, then changing it back to the way it originally was, selecting an outfit, eating a few strawberries for breakfast, and carefully applying her makeup the Sun had completely risen and was basking her entire room with the soft light. Taking one last look into her mirror and giving her reflection a satisfied smile, the Yamanaka heiress headed off to the academy.

She wore a pair of short, black tights which ended just below her knee long under a slim-fitted purple dress which ended at mid-thigh and was bisected at her waist with a simple black, leather belt whose buckle was the very same shade of black. Her shoes were a normal pair of black shinobi sandals. Her lips were covered with a subtle, light pink lip stick, and her eyes had the faintest dusting of grey shadow to bring out her eyes. Even at this age, young Ino had style.

Her hair was growing longer and had reached to the middle of her shoulders, she preferred it short but the rumor was that Sasuke preferred long-haired girls and well, some things just had to be done in the name of Love.

'_I wonder where Sasuke will be sitting today.' _The girl wondered to herself as she walked along the village street. _'He's so unpredictable with the way he just sits wherever, like he won't even be controlled by habit. Oh my god he's so cute! But then, lately there's someone else who's not so bad...' _Suddenly her thoughts wandered from the dark-haired, black-eyed Uchiha to a certain blonde-haired, blue-eyed Uzamaki.

_'For a while he was just some pompous loser who tried to be cool. Lately though, he's become more interesting, and wayyyyy cooler!' _Such idle thoughts drifted through the girl's mind until she was just about to enter the school house and a glaring shock of pink hair caught the corner of her eye.

_'Tch, here we go again, I guess.'_

"Good morning Ino-pig." The pinkette called in a falsley cheery tone. "Did you spend too much time gorging yourself on ice cream last night? You've got bags the size of your hips under those eyes."

A lie, as she was fully aware but it irked her nonetheless. "Oh hello, Forehead. I'd say that I hadn't seen you but with a dome like that they can probably see you in Suna. In fact I think we might have to do something about that, something like that is a threat to a hiddan village's security. I guss I can only hope the ANBU will "relocate" you one of these days."

Her tone remained carefully frosty as she said it but inwardly she sighed, it still pained her sometimes that the girl used to be her best friend, and that she threw her away for a rivalry over a boy really stung. There were plenty of girls that she knew who shared a crush and were still perfectly good friends. But then, she supposed that was the price of having a best friend who was completely insane.

The two kunoichi-to-be bickered continuously as they headed into the building, battling to be the first to enter the class where their beloved Sasuke was certainly waiting for them. As the duo busted into the room, both proclaiming themselves the "winner", Ino's gaze immediately fell on the two individuals who were already in the room. One was Ryo Hagase, the class rebel, a tall, dark skinned boy with wildly unruly blue hair which he wore in a shaggy mane down to his shoulders. He sat behind a desk, leaning casually back on a chair, he glanced briefly at the two girls before closing his eyes in disinterest. The other was Uzamaki Naruto the class...rival to Hagase? That seemed to be his only function within the class, when he and the Ryo weren't battling it out in some competition or another he blended almost perfectly with the rest of the class. That is, if one didn't pay too much attention to his eyes, which spoke of an indomitable strength one rarely saw in one so young. He was sitting quietly at a desk, taking notes from a large scroll which lay spread out before him. He didn't even bother to look up at the girls.

Ino gave a disappointed sigh when she failed to spot the Uchiha prodigy before making her way resignedly to a random seat and waiting for the arrival of her friends...or Sasuke.

Class went on as usual that day until the third hour when Iruka-sensei announced that day would be a taijuitsu placement tournament, the class reacted with mostly excitement, some trepidation, and just a little bit of indifference, depending on which shinobi hopeful one was paying attention to.

Ino, who had once been ranked number two in the class when it came to hand-to-hand was now ranked number ten, a fact which she insisted to herself that she did not mind, there was only one girl over her in that area after all and she was a _Hyuuga, _taijuitsu was pretty much all they had going for them.

Her opponent, was the number nine ranked in the class, Uzamaki Naruto, they were the lowest ranked in their skill class so were the first seeded to fight, it was an upwards climb. The ranking bouts were fought from the highest order down so that the ones who did better from the lower seeds would fight from the losers from the upper seeds. It was all quite convoluted but it seemed to make sense to the sensei.

"Yamanaka Ino and Uzamaki Naruto, please approach the sparring ring." As they both made for the ring and faced each other, Iruka explained to them the rules. "This is an 5 minute spar, it will be point scored so even if you can't knock your opponent out, points can still earn you the win. This is a taijuitsu only fight, no ninjuitsu, genjuitsu, kenjuitsu, or fuinjuitsu will be permitted. That means no kunai or shuriken either. We got that?" He asked looking to first Naruto then Ino to witness their respective acknowledgement of the rules which they were already entirely familiar with.

"Alight then," the chuunin instructer cleared his throat and spread his his arms out to each side in front of the competitors before quickly snapping his arms down and jumping back quickly. "Begin!"

Before the match had ever even started, Ino had decided that she would probably lose. Naruto's skills had been increasing at an alarming rate for the past few years, he had gone from the skill level of the average civilian kid, his skill with kunai not counted, to being second only to Sasuke and Hagase in most fields. He was still ranked as sixth place over all but if he did well in this he would probably shoot to either third or fourth place.

_'Hmmm, well I haven't practiced my taijuitsu in what feels like ages, and everyone knows that Naruto-kun trains harder than anyone!' _The blond girl thought to herself as their sensei explained to them the rules. _'Even so, I _am _Yamanaka Ino, I'm only in tenth place because I didn't really feel like breaking a nail. As long as I keep him moving and don't let him score any big hits I should be able to get in enough points to not lose too badly.'_

"Begin!"

_'Guess it's showtime. I'll charge him in order to take him out of his rhythm from the start. Hmmm, so he's just going to stand there and let me charge him, huh? Alright then then, how about we get this started with a right hook to his kidneys? He still isn't guarding? Oh well, here goes!' _Ino felt a sharp pain in her head for a split second before her world went black for what felt like an instant. Next thing she knew, she was looking up at the sky and thinking that the Sun felt delightful on her skin before remembering what she was supposed to be doing and bolting up into a sitting position.

"Oh! She's awake, Shikamaru."

"Tch, troublesome."

The girl's gaze focused on her two childhood friends, Nara Shikamaru and Akimichi Chouji, though she never admitted to such a connection to the two as they were renowned as the laziest, most good-for-nothing students in the entire academy. "Shikamaru-kun, Chouji-kun, what happened?" The answer came as a lazy drawl from the Nara.

"Naruto kicked you in the jaw when you swung at him. You should remember to clench your teeth next time... I guess you're lucky that he didn't break it though." The last part Ino was barely able to catch as the two boys had already started walking away before he had even finished his sentence.

"Lazy ass-holes," She muttered to herself as she rose unsteadily to her feet and headed towards the crowd of students where the tournament was still clearly going on. "they could have at least asked if I was ok."

It turned out that she had only been out for a few minutes and Sasuke was currently occupied with the number two at taijuitsu, Ryo Hagase. Though he was a rebel who seemed to dislike any and all forms of authority and had abysmal grades due to never doing any actual work in class, most people were of the opinion that he was a genius on the same caliber as Sasuke. Hagase came from a mysterious clan which had apparently been destroyed when he was very young and Konoha had taken him and his mother in as the only survivors. Exactly what his clan did, none of the students but Naruto had any idea, but it was clear for all to see that he excelled at taijuitsu as well as ninjuitsu despite never really seeming to try. Except for against the Uzamaki.

The fight between the two boys seemed to be almost entirely even, with neither able to gain any real advantage but when the time was called, Sasuke was reveiled to be the winner by a paper-thin margin. To the surprise of the croud, it was Sasuke who looked the most annoyed, Hagase seemed almost indifferent to the results of the match and headed off to sit under a nearby tree.

Ino, however only scoffed in slight exasperation, _"Tch, that damn Hagase, he only has the courtesy to take a match seriously when he's going against Naruto. How dare he take Sasuke-kun so lightly!" _For not the first time, the girl found herself wandering exactly what was between them that made the typically aloof Hagase so competitive when it came to the Uzamaki.

_"I don't remember it always being this way..." _she thought to herself with a thoughtful frown forming along her brow. "_it seems like over-night that they suddenly became rivals. Maybe something happened between them outside of class? That seems like the only reasonable explanation. Not that it really matters though, in the end, everyone is inferior to Sasuke."_

With a small sigh, Ino absently observed the next bunch of matches while allowing her mind to wander around various topics, most of them having to do with the young Uchiha. Eventually she found her gaze drawn to the boy who had just defeated her with a rather frustratingly small amount of effort, who was rather intently watching the current fight going on between the number six, Hyuuga Hinata, and the number seven, Akimichi Chouji. This made sense as the loser would be his next opponent.

She felt rather complicated towards the boy at the moment, on the one hand, he was well known as the hardest working student in the entire class, even more so than Sasuke. On top of that, he had been steadily working his way up the class rankings for some time now. And yet, there was something profoundly annoying about being so completly surpassed in what seemed to be every shinobi aspect by someone she recalled being significantly better than not long ago.

Ino attempted to justify this by telling herself that it was only natural for boys to make better shinobi than girls did, or that the amount of training required to stay at such a level would make her no good as a bride. But somehow neither of these really satisfied her. _"It's fine." _the girl told herself, not very convincingly _"as long as I remain the top female...it's fine."_

In the back of her mind however, the Yamanaka began to wonder when it was that she began to think like that. The had once been a time when she had allowed herself to lose to no one, she had seen even Uchicha Sasuke as a rival, someone she would definately not lose to. Somewhere down the line she began making concessions, excuses,somewhere down the line, she had become okay with being weak.

With a shake of her head, Ino dislodged such unpleasant thoughts from her mind and chose instead to dwell on more agreeable topics, such as the how strikingly Sasuke's hair danced in the wind when he was fighting.

**Hinata's POV**

"Next up for the top seed, Hyuuga Hinata vs Akimichi Chouji!"

The small, timid looking girl visibly flinched when she heard her name being called. She already knew how this fight would end, without question, she would lose. It seemed like no matter what she did, every time they had a placement test she fell further and further down in the rankings. The Hyuuga heiress just couldn't handle the stress that the tests put her under, every time her mind would go completely blank, her entire body would shake and it would take all of her control to keep from fainting.

With the dejected air of one approaching the execution block, Hinata made her way to the fighter's ring to face her opponent. The girl did not know much about the young Akimichi, only that he was rather chubby and had the tendency to win his fights with one-hit ko's. In terms of physical strength, only Ryo was even capable of competing with him but he was also rather slow and lacked much of a killer instinct. Even so, Hinata found him rather intimidating as they stared each other down from opposites sides of the ring.

"Begin!"

Chouji rushed straight in, deceptively fast for someone of his size, he threw a devastating right hook directly at the much smaller girl's temple, which said girl neatly dodged. Having dodged purely on instinct, Hinata danced around the larger boy, creating distance between them once she was facing his back.

_"That was scary! That punch would have killed me for sure if it had hit me! I don't want to do this! It's scary! Mother! It's scary! Please, help me! Im afraid!"_

Hinata waited in a panic for her opponent's next onslaught as he changed tactics and began slowly stalking her as she tried to keep as much distance as possible between them. Unfortunately, all of the boy's attempts at cornering seemed her to be entirely futile as the Hyuuga would jump nimbly around him if they ever got close to a corner. Finally Chouji lost patience and began charging at the girl, only for her to swiftly dodge his every attack and create a comfortable distance between them once again.

_"He still hasn't hit me yet! Maybe I can win this? But if I fight him he might hit me with one of those terrifying punches! If I come back with a black eye father will know that I lost! I don't want to do this. I want to quit! I want mother to comfort me!"_

As the Hyuuga heiress continued her inner monologue of terror, the five minutes concluded with one severely out of breath Akimichi, panting on his knees and marveling at his inability to lay so much as finger on his opponent.

"Winner, Hyuuga Hinata!"

**AUTHOR'S NOTE**

**S****orry for the abysmal shortness of this chapter. I wanted to turn SOMETHING in! I promise a proper chapter turned in by this weekend! **


	9. Wherein preteens try to kill each other

"Winner, Hyuuga Hinata!"

Naruto could not help but feel slightly annoyed with the match he had jut witnessed. As the heir to the illustrious Hyuuga clan, Hinata was one of the few people in class who he could almost consider a social equal. Yet it seemed that every day she acted less and less like someone capable of handling _any_ sort of responsibility, much less become the head of a clan as powerful and ancient as the Hyuuga. That match had been an absolute travesty, it was claer for anyone to see that Hinata had completely outclassed her opponent and had been in complete control of the match from it's inception till the very end. Despite this, from the look on her face one might easily think that she had been fighting for her life against a truly intimidating opponent rather then the bumbling, albiet powerful attacks of Akimichi Chouji.

Being honest with himself, Naruto did not think that anyone in the entire class would be able to best the timid girl in straight taijutsu if she ever actually got serious, exept perhaps for Ryo.

_'It's not that she's weak, at least not physically. There's something that's holding her back...Why is there so much fear, so much _weakness _in her gaze?'_

Speaking of weakness, the boy's attention suddenly shifted to his first opponent, Yamanka Ino. If he felt annoyed by the match between Hinata and Chouji, he was positively infuriated with his match against the fellow blonde.

She had once been one of his goals, looking back, he had both admired and envied the girl for her natural skill and grace. There had once been a time when he had seen real strength in the girl's eyes, they had been eyes which seemed to contantly look down at everything around her, cool enough to freeze the sun. Once upon a time, Naruto had wished that he could have eyes like that, the eyes of royalty.

Now though, her gaze had softened, when he had looked into them as they charged towards him, it had not been confidence, or strength, or resolve which he saw. They were eyes which had already accepted defeat.

Being the first male in an extremely long and unbroken chain of famel Uzamaki heir, Naruto had actually been rather envious of his female colleagues. He was all too aware that the minimal powers of purification which had resided within all of his ancestors were almost entirely depleted due to his being a male. Though he would never admit it to anyone, there was a large part of him that whished had been been born a female, with red hair and green eyes, like his mother.

Not that he wasn't proud of his father, of course. His father had been a great man, strong and brilliant, a worthy match for one with imperial blood. But amazing as he may have been, he was just the "consort" as the ancient laws would have put it. All of the power of the Uzamaki blood line resided within it's women, and Naruto was born a man.

Of course, he had long ago decided that this slight inconvinience would not hinder his ambitions in the slightest. One way or the other, he would restore the legacy of his ancestors, and unite the land under one banner. And he knew exactly how he would do just that, and by "exactly" he meant that he had a vague plan that he trusted to work itself out as it went along.

The current fight taking place in the top seed **(which is of course, the only one really relevant to the story which is why it's the only one being discussed) **was Ueyama Takahata, the number six versus the number five ranked Aburame Shino.

Takahata was a civilian born student who was well known as "tough guy" amongst his civilian born peers. He was also the younger brother of Ueyama Broli, the strongest delinquent in Konoha, rumored to be even stronger than most shinobi in a straight out fight. The younger Ueyama had joined the Ninja academy in hopes of surpassing his brother and one thing both siblings shared was the their complete ruthlessness in a fight.

The moment the match was called, Takahata launched a flying knee atack directly towards his opponent's face, aiming to end the match with a single attack. Shino however, being no slouch himself, managed to simply duck the atack and spun around to face his opponent just in time to block a haymaker to his jaw.

Not giving the introverted boy any time to recover, Takahata immediatly followed with with a left uppercut, taking advantage of his opponent being knocked off balance from blocking his first punch.

Shino barely managed to sway away from the punch, getting clipped on the edge on his chin before countering with a straight kick into the over-zealous boy's stomach which connected solidly.

Luckily for Takahata, he was quite used to taking hits, as his brother tended to dish them out on a daily basis in order "toughen him up". Having sensed the attack coming, he had flexed his abs as hard as he could in order to absorb the kick as best as he could.

Shino, not willing ti give his opponent time to recover, quickly followed up with a round-house kick to the other boy's head which was neatly dodged.

Wasting no time, young Ueyama drew his elbows in and hunched his back to minimilize his openings and rushed into his opponent's striking zone before throwing a strong right to his kidneys.

Shino barely managed to drop his elbow to block the attack and even so the punch was strong enough to completely numb his arm from the elbow down. Seeing his chance, the insect-lover threw a downward right hook at Takahata's exposed temple, not seeing the fist which had already been thown from his blind spot.

"Winner, Ueyama Takahata!"

Shino woke up to be greeted by the vast blue sky.

"I'm staring up at the sky, why? Because I lost. How mortifying."

"Next match Harumi Tenshi versus Inuzaka Kiba"

Harumi Tenshi and Kiba were long time friends who had always competed against each other whenever they took enough interest in something that is. Tenshi was a rather tall boy, with a solid frame for a ten year old, from a clan of weapon specialists.

Inuzaka Kiba was slightly shorter then his friend but a bit wider and he usually won most competetions against Tenshi that had to do with shinobi related skills.

Both students made their way confidentally into the fightier's ring, rolling their shoulders and posturing toughly as they circled each other.

"Ready to lose again, Shi-chan?" Kiba mocked with a smirk.

"Tch, ready to get spaded, Dog Boy?" Tenshi countered with a scowl. It never ceased to annoy him how Kiba always managed to beat him.

"Begin!"

The two boys lunged at each other with no hesitation at all, neither one of them displayed much in the way of technique or skill, but both managed to make up for this with pure strength, speed, and animalistic savagry.

Barely any punches were thrown before both fighters were rolling on the ground in a wrestling match. They kicked, bit, punched, pinched, pulled, scratched and squeezed each other in every attempt the could to cause the other discomfort. Finally, the young Inuzaka managed to wrap himelf around one of his friends arms well enough to lock in a solid arm bar, Tenshi reluctantly tapped when he was sure that his arm was about to break.

"Winner, Inuzaka Kiba"

And so the matches went for some time, Naruto went on to face all of those ahead of him in the top ten in the order that they were in after winning or losing.

Defeating Chouji ended up being a simple matter of getting around to his back and putting the larger boy in a choke hold, which ended up looking rather comical.

He defeated Hinata by glaring are her until she gave up. It took all of thirty seconds.

Shino had been more of a challenge but Naruto finally managed to make him submit with a triangle hold three and a half minutes in.

He and Takahata simply brawled for two and a half minutes until Naruto's greater stamina won out and he was able to knock the larger boy out with a decisive knee to the groin.

By the time te Uzamaki made it to Kiba's rival a bit of a crowd had started to gather around the ring, it was quite rare for a student to win so many matches in a row during a ranking tournament.

Tenshi's match only lasted a few minutes, due to his unpolished fighting stlye and confidence brought on from being much larger than his opponent, he had simply rushed in, hoping to tackle the blond to the ground in order to capitolaze on the size difference.

What happened was that he ended up charging face-first into Naruto's knee.

The fight with Kiba took a bit longer, the Inuzaka was fast and had good instincts when it came to fighting. Naruto only managed to win by allowing the larger boy to take hm down and surprising him with his own grappling skill and the fact that the smaller boy was actually much stronger than he looked. A scissor leg, choke hold ended up making the stubborn dog-boy pass out.

"Next match, Uzamaki Naruto versus Ryo Hagase!"

By now, the the majority of the class had more or less finished their placement bouts and were crouding around the ring in order to get a closer look at the match.

Matches between Hagase and Naruto were always interesting and very heated, the fact that the former numer then ranker had moved up to a second place contender in a single day was also the cause of much interest.

All around the croud, speculation and even wagers were being placed on who would come out on top in this match up. The favorite was, of course Hagase as his rival was already worn out from fighting seven other students before making it to this match. And all of them had been the strongest in the whole class.

Hagase confidentally made his way to the sparring area, slowly stretching out his arms, neck, and abdomen. "Geez, it took you long enough to make it here, Naruto. I was beggining to wonder if you'd end up losing to Shino for a second there."

The blonde merely scoffed at this, "I'm sorry that I made you worry but you shouldn't bother. You know that I can't stand to go a day without stomping your face in the ground."

"Begin!"

Naruto leapt forward with a savage grin on his face he jumped into the air and aimed a spinning round house kick at Hagase's head which was dodged neatly but he had been expecting as much.

Keeping the momentum of his kick, he brought his other foot around like a helicopter in order to get a second chance at his opponent.

This attack Hagase chose to block by bringing his own foot up to an almost vertical position and neatly rebounding the strike.

As Naruto fell he twisted he position to land on his hand with his legs still up, taking advantage of Hagase's one-legged status he brought both legs together as he spun like a top, bringing them down to sweep at the larger boy's legs.

Hagase jumped up with his one leg and spun sidewayse in the air before swiftly bringing his left leg crashing down on his rival's head.

Naruto continued his spin as he brought his leg over his head again and them in order order to block the kick with one leg and with the other he kicked out at the offended appendage's kneed cap.

The larger boy pushed off of the blonde's leg and hit an easy back-flip, evading the counter-strike and creating some distance between the two of them.

Naruto quickly recovered from his position and landed himself back on his feet, the moment his feet had touched the groun though, the other boy was already charging towards him and aiming a devastatingly fast left straight at his head.

He barely managed to avoid the strike by moving his head to the side and diverting the punch to the side with both of his arms.

Quick to capitolize, Hagase aimed a swift kick to the blonde's side which connected solidly, he even thought he felt a few ribs crack.

Naruto grimaced slightly in pain at the kick's impact but before he could recover, he founf his visions rather impaired by the hand which had suddenly grabbed his face and was now pushing his head down and rather painfully into the ground.

Hagase only a moment to smirk as the moment the blonde head hit the ground, he found his arm being constricted by his rival's arms and his leg's were attempting to control his neck.

_"A triangle hold? As if I'd let you!"_

With a roar of strength, the larger boy lifted Naruto's entire body with one arm and slammed him head-first into the dirt.

Senseing is intentions, the small boy quickly released the arm and aimed an executioner's kick at Hagase's head. which found it's mark terrifically.

Before the larger boy's head could even touch the ground, Naruto had repositioned himself in midair and grabbed the shaggy mane of hair. Twisting into a corkscrew to gain momentum, pulled the other boy's head upas he flipped until he landed himself on his feet and used the force to pull the larger boy over Naruto's own head and tossed him into the croud of his peers.

There was a a few moments of loud scuffling amongst the croud before Hagase emerged with an enraged snarl and used the bodies of his comrades the launch himself toward the blonde nuisance.

Naruto leaped back just in time to dodge a dangerous looking hand chop and was force to continue to retreat as said attack was wuickly followed by a lightning-fast leg sweep.

This attack fed into a jumping double-kick which the blonde was only able to partially block, he managed to divert the first kick to his chest by the follow up connected solidly witht he side of his head.

The force of the blow sent him careening sideways, he quickly tucked himself into a ball and rolled with the attack before flipping back onto his feet, his still slid back some and had to use his hand to steady himself.

Hagase allowed to even a moment's respite as he immediatly pursued Naruto, landing a savage toe kick to the smaller boy's chin that sent him rocketing skyward however the larger boy was far from done with him.

As Naruto's body went entirely vertical, Ryo Hagasa landed two vicious punches to the young prince's abdomen before grabbing onto his feet and twirling the other boy over over his headlike a lasso.

With a savage grin, Hagase flung the boy onto the ground with all of his strength, cracking the blonde's body against the ground like a wet rag.

Still, the larger boy refused to let go and lifted his rival once again into the air and back onto the ground as he spun around one hundred and eighty degrees in order to increase momentum.

Several times this was repeated until Hagase seemed to grow bored and flung the limp body straight into the air, a manic grin covered his face as he jumped after the body.

Whilst still in the air, he positioned the prone figure into a basic pile driver form with the smaller boy's legs and head switch with his own. And then they fell.

Less then a second before hitting the ground, Naruto wrapped his legs around his opponent's neck and twisted with all of his might. Causing Hagase to let go of the smaller boy just long enough got said boy to flip himself around, legs still around the other boy's neck.

CRASH!

Naruto used all of his power to fling his rival's head into the ground before positioning himself to land safely on his feet.

Hagase was barely able to curl his body into a ball as he hit the ground, so instead of likey breaking his neck and skull he probbaly only broke his shoulder and a few other "minor bones".

The momentum caused him to roll for several seconds before he opened up his body and pushed off the ground with his hands in order to gain some stability on his own two feet.

What he got instead was both of Naruto's feet drop kicking him squarely in the face.

Hagase's body sailed through the air and bounced of of the ground in a clumsy roll as the enraged prince pursued the flying body ruthlessly.

On the second bounce, the taller boy begand to gain his bearings just long enough to be kneed rather painfully in the face and thrown by his hair into a tree which he hit face-first.

Naruto's expression promised death as he threw himself into another drop kick, this time directly on his opponents back.

Hagase let out an anguished cry as it impacted which only seemed to feed the blonde's fury.

Using his opponent's back as a spring board, Naruto rebounded off of the tree and prapared his second attack, it was at this moment that his rival bunched his body into a tight ball and sprung off the tree with his hands, propelling both his feet into the prince's face.

"How do _you _like it bitch!"

For five minutes the battle went much ike this, only getting more and more savage as the time went by. Niether side seemed willing to give even an inch

Eventully, the fight simply turned into a brawl with either side grounded in one spot and refusing to give a centimeter of ground.

Hagase connected with a viccious right hook to his opponent's facewhich he followed immediatly with a left of the same kind and then grabbing then pulling his head toward him ended the combo with a monstrous knee to the face.

Naruto responded by head-butting the taller boy in the solar plexus and hammering his right rib cage with elbow before bringing his hand up in a vicious upper cut.

The time buzzer rang and immediately all of the chuunin instructors rushed in to break the two up.

"Winner: Ryo Hagase"

The entire class was completely silent, they had all been completely drawn into the fight the intensity of it had seemed like that of a life or death match, many had nearly forgotten that it was only a five minute long spar.

That a "winner" could be chosen just like that because of some supposed point system seemed ridiculous, especially considering how closely matched the two were.

"The hell!" One student spoke up from within the gaggle of wannabe ninja which had gathered during the fight. "How the fuck are we supposed to be ok with it ending like that! There's no way you can just pick a winner like that!"

This proclomation seemed agree with what most of the student body had been thinking and a murmur of ascent rolled through them like a wave of indignation.

More shouts of protest were heard until the croud began to seem much more like an angry mob then a group on irrate ten year olds.

Umino Iruka, as senior instructor of the class, took it upon himself to appease the students and cleared his throath before trying to calm the students down. He smiled pleasantly and his young charges and raised his hands in mock surrender.

"Now, now, settle down class. The point system is very reliable if you want to discuss-"

"Fuck discussion, Iruka-sensei! Let the fight keep goin'!" Interrupted one random voice, which Iruka suspected to be Kiba.

"Oraaaahhh! Keep it goin'!"

And just like that, the croud was even more wild than before, the screams were getting even more racous than ever before and an all too familiar vein was beggining to pulse on Iruka's forehead.

"I SAID, SHUT THE HELL UP!" The chuunin instructor screamed, using a mild genjustu to make it seem like his head had increased to a ridiculous sze. Instantly, the class became etirely silent.

Satisfied with the obedience of his students, the teach cleared his throught and continued with he message. "As I was saying, the scoring system is very rigid and entirely trustworthy. The entire spar was completely observed by no less than three upper-ranked chuunin, myelf included so I assure that the decisions is legitimate and final.

However, given the peculiarity and intenstiy of that particular spar, I don't mind sharing with you the details." Here the young man pulled out a small, yellow peice of paper and began to read from it.

"The taijutsu level placement bout between the number three ranked Uzamaki Naruto and the number two ranked Ryo Hagase ended with the folowing results:

Total number of solid hits landed- Hagase 214, Naruto 198

Total number of hits dodged- Hagase 52, Naruto 28

Total number of hits blocked- Hagase 31, Naruto 32

Total number of throws- Hagase 7, Naruto 5

Total number of throws reversed- Hagase 2, Naruto 6

Total number of counters- Hagase 27, Naruto 14

Total accuracy- Hagase 72.6%, Naruto 65.4%

And so you see, though it may have seemed to you academy students that the fight was evenly matched, in reality Hagase was winning the entire time, if you just look at the numbers anyways. Though in a real fight between shinobi, numbers like this don't really mean much."

And with that, the tournament was concluded and Naruto and Hagasa had long since left school for the day.


	10. Chapter 8 teaser and update

**Hey guys, Hypno here! Let me first start off by apologizing for taking so long to update but Army life has been keeping me busy and I'm working on getting my degree as well. Reading back on this story there are a lot of things I want to change so the moment I can get around to it you can expect some revisions to the story. Mostly it shall be just cleaning up the grammar and spelling mistakes but there are a few plot holes and incongruities I need to patch up as well.**

**I'm still rather swamped in my studies but here is a little teaser for chapter 8. Please don't hate me.**

Ino was livid. It was bad enough that Naruto completely crushed her in their spar but he had proceeded to fly through the ranking tournament as if to punctuate the point just for her that they were not even in the same league. Not only had the annoying boy jumped from then tenth slot to the third slot in just one day but he had ended it with what may have been the most bad-ass taijutsu spar the academy had ever seen!

It was simply not fair! She could understand that someone who trained as hard as Naruto would naturally become stronger but he had no right or reason to be so cool about it!

And it was this and similar lines of reasoning that found young Yamanaka Ino doggedly pursuing the boy who had defeated her so effortlessly only an hour so previously. Not forgetting her training, she made sure to remain far enough behind him as to not have her presence detected and she found that she was smirking despite herself at the fact that her quarry had not seemed to notice her.

Unfortunately that smirk did not last long as almost as soon as it appeared the small blond boy in front of her stopped in the middle of the walkway and turned to her with a rather surly but still obnoxiously arrogant smirk of his own.

"Come for a rematch, Ino-san?"

**And there we have it! I promise to do my very best to have the full chapter up by the fifteenth as I have two tests and a final to prepare for but I seriously want to get this story back on track.**

**Until next time my lovelies!**


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